Apparatus and accompanying methods for implementing network servers for use in providing interstitial web advertisements to a client computer

ABSTRACT

A technique for implementing in a networked client-server environment, e.g., the Internet, network-distributed advertising in which advertisements are downloaded, from an advertising server to a browser executing at a client computer, in a manner transparent to a user situated at the browser, subsequently displayed, by that browser and on an interstitial basis, in response to a click-stream generated by the user to move from one web page to the next. Specifically, an HTML advertising tag is embedded into a referring web page. This tag contains two components. One component effectively downloads, from an distribution web server and to an extent necessary, and then persistently instantiates an agent at the client browser. The other component is a reference, in terms of a web address, of the advertising management system. The ad management system selects the given advertisement that is to be downloaded, rather than having that selection or its content being embedded in the web content page.

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION

This application is a division of co-pending patent application Ser. No.09/237,718, filed Jan. 26, 1999 and entitled “A TECHNIQUE FORIMPLEMENTING BROWSER-INITIATED USER-TRANSPARENT NETWORK-DISTRIBUTEDADVERTISING AND FOR INTERSTITIALLY DISPLAYING AN ADVERTISEMENT, SODISTRIBUTED, THROUGH A WEB BROWSER IN RESPONSE TO A USER CLICK-STREAM”,which itself is a continuation-in-part of, now abandoned, patentapplication Ser. No. 09/080,165, filed May 15, 1998 and entitled“LOCALLY-SUMMONED NETWORK-DISTRIBUTED CONFIRMED INFORMATIONALPRESENTATIONS”.

BACKGROUND OF THE DISCLOSURE

1. Field of the Invention

The invention relates to a technique, specifically apparatus andaccompanying methods, for implementing in a networked client-serverenvironment, such as the Internet, network-distributed advertising inwhich an advertisement is downloaded, from an advertising server to aweb browser executing at a client computer, in a manner transparent to auser situated at the browser, and subsequently displayed, by thatbrowser and on an interstitial basis, in response to a click-streamgenerated by the user to move from one web page to the next.

2. Description of the Prior Art

Currently, Internet usage, and particularly that of the World Wide Web(henceforth referred to as simply the “web”), is growing explosively,particularly as the number of web sites and users that have access tothe Internet continue to rapidly and to a great extent, exponentially,expand.

In essence, after establishing a suitable network connection to theInternet, a user at a client computer can easily employ a graphical webbrowser, such as the Internet Explorer (“IE”) browser presentlyavailable from Microsoft Corporation of Redmond, Wash., to connect to aweb site and then download a desired web page by simply supplying aspecific address (known as a URL or uniform resource locator) of thatpage to the browser. The URL identifies both an address of the site, interms of its Internet domain name, and a page of information at thatsite, in terms of its corresponding file name. Each web site stores atleast one, and often times substantially more pages all arranged in apre-defined hierarchy, generally beginning, at its root, with aso-called “home page”. Each such page is written in HTML (hypertextmarkup language) form. A page, in this context, refers to contentaccessed via a single URL, including, e.g., text, graphics and otherinformation specified in the HTML code for that particular page. Once auser supplies a URL of interest, the browser operated by that user sendsan appropriate command, using a TCP/IP protocol (transmission controlprotocol/internet protocol), to a remote HTTP (hypertext transportprotocol) server, located at the web site and which stores that page, toaccess and download a corresponding file for that page. In response, theserver then sends, using the TCP/IP protocol, a stored file containingHTML code that constitutes that page back to the browser. As the filethat constitutes the page itself is received by the browser, the browserinterprets and executes the HTML code in that file to properly assembleand render the page on, e.g., a monitor to a user situated at the clientcomputer. Such a page may itself contain HTML commands that referenceother files, residing on the same or different web sites, which, whenthese commands are appropriately interpreted and executed by thebrowser, result in those files being downloaded and their resultingcontent properly assembled by the browser into the rendered page. Onceall the content associated with the page is rendered, the user can thenposition his(her) mouse cursor on a suitable hypertext link, button orother suitable user input field (whichever here implements a “hotlink”)displayed on that page and then, through, e.g., a mouse “click”,effectively download a file for and render another desired page insuccession until the user has finished his(her) visit to that site, atwhich point, the user can transition through a hotlink to a page atanother site, and so forth. A hotlink specifies a complete web addressof an associated page, including a domain name of its hosting web siteat which that page is situated. Consequently, by simply and successivelypositioning and “clicking” his(her) mouse at an appropriate hotlink foreach one of a number of desired web pages, the user can readily retrievean HTML file for each desired page in succession from its correspondingweb site and render that page, and, by doing so, essentiallyeffortlessly jump from site to site, regardless of where those sites arephysically located.

Ever since their introduction several years ago, HTML and accompanyingbrowser software, now including, e.g., attendant programming languagessuch as Java and JavaScript languages (“Java” is a registered trademarkof Sun Microsystems in Mountain View, Calif.; “JavaScript” is atrademark of Netscape Communications in Mountain View, Calif.), haveundergone rather rapid and continual evolution. A major purpose of whichhas been and continues to be to provide web page authors with an abilityto render increasingly rich content through their pages and, as aresult, heighten a “user experience” for those users who visit thesepages. Consequently, web pages are no longer limited to relativelysimple textual displays—as occurred with early versions of HTML andbrowser software, but can now encompass even full-motion multimediapresentations and interactive games that use rather sophisticatedgraphics.

The simplicity of browsing the web coupled with the relative low-cost ofaccessing the Internet, and the relative ease through which a web sitecan be established are collectively fueling unparalleled growth anddiffusion of the Internet itself, web sites and the Internet usercommunity throughout the world. In that regard, by establishing websites, merchants, vendors and other information providers have anunparalleled opportunity, basically unheard of as little as 5-10 yearsago, to reach enormous numbers of potential consumers—regardless ofwhere these consumers reside—at costs far less than previously thoughtpossible. Moreover, given the staggering amount and wide diversity ofinformation currently available on the web, web browsing is becoming sopopular a past-time for sufficient numbers of individuals that browsingis beginning to divert significant viewership away from traditionalforms of mass entertainment, such as television and cable. While suchdiversion is relatively small at present, it is likely to rapidly grow.Moreover, given the ease and convenience with which users, situated attheir personal computers and with basically nothing more complicatedthan a few mouse clicks, can effectively interact with remote web sites,electronic commerce, through which goods and services are orderedthrough the Internet without ever visiting a physical store, is rapidlyemerging as a significant sales medium. This medium is likely tosignificantly challenge and possibly, over a relatively short time, mayeven alter traditional forms of retailing.

Given the wide and ever-growing reach of the web as a source of consumerinformation and the increasing consumer acceptance of electroniccommerce, advertisers have clearly recognized the immense potential ofthe web as an effective medium for disseminating advertisements to aconsuming public.

Unfortunately, conventional web-based advertising, for various practicalreasons—some being technical in nature and others relating to a natureof traditional web advertisements themselves, has generally yieldedunsatisfactory results and thus has usually been shunned by most largeadvertisers. In that regard, several approaches exist in the art forimplementing web based advertisements. However, all suffer seriouslimitations of one form or another that have sharply restricted theirdesirability and use.

Currently, a predominant format, referred to as a “banner”, for a webadvertisement takes the form of a rectangular graphical displaysituated, typically at a fixed location, in a rendered web page. Abanner, which can be static or animated, can be situated anywhere withina rendered web page but most often is situated at a top or bottom, oralong a vertical edge of that page. A banner, depending on its size, canextend across an entire page width or length, and usually contains, in agraphical eye-catching form, a name of a product or service beingadvertised. Increasingly, a banner for a given product or serviceimplements a hotlink to enable a consumer to “click-through” the banner(i.e., generate a mouse click on the banner) in order to transition, viahis browser, to a web site maintained by a corresponding advertiser and,from that site, fetch a web page to provide additional informationregarding that product or service. Hence, the consumer could easilyobtain more information by a click-through; while an advertiser,monitoring counts of such click-throughs that occur in a given period oftime, could gain feedback on the effectiveness of the correspondingbanner.

A banner is generally produced by properly embedding specific HTML codefor that banner within the HTML coding for a given web page in which thebanner is to appear. A client browser, as it interprets and sequentiallyexecutes the HTML code for a fetched page, will, in turn, compile andexecute the embedded code for the banner and hence display the banner,as part of a rendered page and at a specified location thereon.

In implementing a banner, whether static or even animated, its HTMLcoding generally involved downloading an appropriate file, for thatbanner, to a client browser. The file may be stored on the same serverthat stores the HTML file for the page, or accessed from a remoteserver. The file may contain a graphic itself, such as in a GIF (graphicinterchange format) file, or a Java applet which, once interpreted andexecuted by the browser, generates and renders a desired animatedgraphic. This file, whether it be a graphic or applet, requires time todownload and must be downloaded and assembled by the browser on the pageprior to that page being fully rendered. The download time for thatfile, particularly as it increases in size, clearly, a priori, lengthensa time interval during which that page would completely download,thereby extending the time to fully render the page, including thebanner, after a user transitioned to that page. Channel bandwidth to aclient computer (e.g., personal computer—PC), such as that providedthrough a modem connection, is often rather limited. Consequently, ifthe file size for the banner were relatively large—as would certainly bethe case for relatively “rich” content, e.g., audio or video content,the delay in downloading such a file over such a limited bandwidthconnection could be excessive, and consequently highly frustrating tothe user. Hence, a user would likely wait a considerable amount of timebefore all the page components for multimedia content are fullydownloaded to permit that page to be rendered. Such delay, ifencountered during a page transition, can be rather frustrating to auser, even to the point at which the user, just to end his(her) waiting,will prematurely terminate the download and transition to another page.Therefore, in an effort to preserve an appropriate “editorialexperience” for a user, content suppliers sharply limit the file size,of such banners to be rendered on their pages, in order to minimize pagedownload and hence latency times.

Unfortunately, such restricted file sizes effectively limit the richnessof the content of a banner to a rather simplistic advertisement—evenwith animation. Thus, banners often failed, as advertisers soonrecognized by relatively low click-through counts, to attract sufficientviewer attention to justify their use and expense.

In an effort to overcome the content limitation associated with banners,the art teaches the use of a different advertising modality: so-called“interstitial” advertisements. See, e.g., U.S. Pat. No. 5,305,195(issued to A. J. Murphy on Apr. 19, 1994—hereinafter the “Murphy”patent) which discloses the concept of using interstitial advertisementsthough not in the context of web advertising. As described in the Murphypatent, pre-stored advertisements are displayed at specific intervals oneach one of a group of networked ATM (automated transaction machines)terminals. In particular, the advertisements are downloaded, eitherdirectly or via a server, from a remote computer and locally stored oneach such terminal and subsequently displayed on that terminal while itwaits for a response, from a remote mainframe transaction server, to atransaction initiated at that terminal.

Generally speaking and with specific reference to web advertising,interstitial ads are displayed in an interval of time that occurs aftera user has clicked on a hot-link displayed by a browser to retrieve adesired web page but before that browser has started rendering thatpage. Such an interval, commonly referred to as an “interstitial”,arises for the simple reason that a browser requires time, once a userclicks on a hotlink for a new page, to fetch a file(s) from a remote webserver(s) for that particular page and then fully assemble and renderthat page. The length of an interstitial interval, which is quitevariable, is governed by a variety of factors, including, e.g., a numberof files required to fully render the new page and the size of each suchfile, and network and server congestion and attendant delays occurringwhen the user activated the hotlink.

Interstitial web advertising is taught in, e.g., U.S. Pat. Nos.5,737,619 and 5,572,643 (both of which issued to D. H. Judson but onApr. 7, 1998 and Nov. 5, 1996, respectively—hereinafter the “Judson”patents). The Judson patents disclose the concept of embedding anadvertisement, as an information object, in a web page file in such amanner that the object will remain hidden and not displayed when thefile is executed to render the page. Rather than being displayed, theinformation object is locally cached by the browser during execution ofthe code for that page. Then, during a transition initiated by useractivation of a hotlink to move from that page to a next successivepage, i.e., during an interstitial, the browser accesses theadvertisement from local cache and displays it until such time as thatnext successive page is downloaded and rendered. See also, publishedInternational patent application WO 97/07656 (to E. Barkat et al andpublished on Mar. 6, 1997) which teaches the concept of “polite”downloading. Here, a browser, on a local computer (e.g., a client PC)downloads, from a remote advertising system server and ostensibly as abackground process, file(s) for a web advertisement only during thoseintervals when bandwidth utilization of a communication channel (link)connected to the browser is less than a pre-established threshold. Such“polite” downloading is intended to minimally interfere with othercommunication applications, then executing on the client PC, which willutilize the link. The browser displays the downloaded ad(s) to the useronly after the user has not interacted, as detected by a conventionalscreen saver process, with his(her) PC for a predefined period of time,such as by neither moving a mouse nor depressing a key on a keyboardduring that period. The server selects those advertisements for downloadto the client PC based on a user-ID and preference information of theuser, who is then situated at that PC, and configuration information ofthat PC, which, when a connection is established between the client PCand the server, the client PC uploads to the server. Though the filesassociated with an interstitial advertisement can be large, these filesare advantageously fetched by a client browser during those intervalswhen otherwise the browser would be idle and hence bandwidth utilizationof its network connection would be relatively low. Such “idle times”would occur, in the absence of processing an interstitial ad, after thebrowser has fully rendered a web page and a user is viewing the page buthas not yet clicked on a hotlink to transition to another page. Duringsuch an idle time, the browser would simply wait for further user input.

By reducing, if not eliminating, problems, inherent in banners andengendered by download latency, interstitial web advertisements, byemploying idle time downloading and local caching, provide a theoreticalpromise of conveying very rich media content with a pleasing “userexperience”. However, interstitial advertisements, as conventionallyimplemented, have serious practical deficiencies which have severelylimited their use.

Conventional interstitial, as well as other forms of current, webadvertisements—here not unlike banners—rely on embedding HTML ad code,as, e.g., a separate non-displayable object, within HTML coding for aweb page. Unfortunately, this approach, inherent in that taught by theJudson patents, can be inflexible and expensive for an advertiser toimplement and particularly later should that advertiser, for whateverreason, seek to modify his(her) ad content. In particular and presently,ad coding is manually inserted into each and every content web page thatis to carry advertising. Consequently, insertion of increasinglysophisticated embedded advertising, such as multi-media or video oraudio, in existing web site content requires a large investment in termsof human resources, time and cost as web sites, particularly largesites, increase a number of content pages available for advertising. Inthat regard, where a banner usually required insertion of, e.g., asingle line of HTML code, content rich advertisements, such as those nowimplemented by parameterized embedded Java advertising applets, oftenconsist of an entire page of coding and hence require far more extensiveand increasingly labor-intensive and costly insertions. Moreover, overtime, advertisers do change their ads—such as by replacing one ad with atotally new version. However, once HTML ad coding is embedded within anumber of web pages, it can be quite impractical and rather costly foran advertiser to access each and every page in which his(her) ad codinghas been inserted and then manually change the ad coding, as desired.The impracticality and attendant cost compound if these pages are copiedto other web sites and hence diffuse through the Internet.

Given these deficiencies, the art teaches a concept of implementing webadvertising through using so-called “push” technology. See, e.g., U.S.Pat. No. 5,740,549 (issued to J. P. Reilly et al on Apr. 14, 1998—hereinafter the “Reilly et al” patent). In essence and as described inthe Reilly et al patent, a client PC, through execution of a “push”application program (called “administration manager”), establishes anetwork connection with an information server, i.e., a “push” webserver, typically during off-hours, such as in the late evening or earlymorning, or at a predefined interval (e.g., every four hours). Theinformation server then downloads, i.e., “pushes”, to the administrationmanager, content files, such as for advertisements and/or otherpredefined information, that are to be played to the user sometimelater. The administration manager, i.e., the “push” application, inturn, stores all the “pushed” content files into a local database(referred to as the “information database”) on a local hard disk and, inresponse to instructions received from the information server, deletesthose previously “pushed” content files which have already beendisplayed. The administration manager also maintains a user profile,which specifies user preferences as to the specific advertising and/orother information (s)he wants to receive, in the information database.As such, through each connection, the information server, by selectingcontent from its database relative to preferences specified in the userprofile, attempts to “push” fresh content to the client PC that islikely to be of interest to the user but without duplicating that whichwas already displayed. Stored “pushed” content is later displayed, usinga data viewer, either on user demand or during those times when the useris not interacting with the system, here too detected by a conventionalscreen saver procedure.

While push technology reduces download latency, by shifting downloads tooccur at off-hours, this technology also suffers serious drawbacks whichhave greatly restricted its practical acceptance.

In particular, to access “pushed” content, a user must initiallydownload and install to his(her) client PC a separate,platform-specific, software application program, as well as subsequentupdates to that program as new push capabilities are released by themanufacturer of the program. Unfortunately, these application programscan often extend to tens of megabytes in length. Since typical Internetusers establish modem connections to their Internet service providers,these users will find that downloading these relatively large programfiles, even in compressed form, will consume an inordinate amount oftime and is generally impractical while (s)he is actively using his(her)client PC. Consequently, these users are constrained to purchasing, atsome cost, an off-the-shelf version of the application program ordownloading that program, typically at no cost for the program itself,at off-hours, when network congestion is relatively light. Furthermore,while some efforts are underway in the art to automatically “push” andinstall incremental software updates to a client PC, thus eliminating aneed for a user to manually do so, the user still faces the burdenassociated with the initial download and installation of the “push”application program.

In addition, “push” application programs continue to increase in size,often considerably, as they provide added capabilities to a user.Downloading and then regularly updating a push application will reduce,sometimes considerably, the amount of disk space available to the useron his(her) client PC. Furthermore, “push” applications rely onperiodically “pushing” large quantities of media content from a pushserver to the client PC and storing that content on the hard disk ofthat PC pending subsequent display. This content, depending on itsvolume, can consume inordinate amounts of hard disk space. Furthermore,advertisers have discovered, not surprisingly, that relatively few PCusers will undertake any affirmative action, such as by downloading andinstalling an application program—almost regardless of its size, toreceive advertisements and other such information.

Faced with these practical, and rather acute, deficiencies inhering inweb advertising conventionally provided on either an interstitial or“push” basis, web advertisers have apparently relegated their efforts todisplaying their advertisements on a banner-like approach, throughreal-time downloading and rendering of advertising HTML files. Here, theadvertising files are sited on remote web servers, rather than beingembedded within given web page HTML files, with appropriate HTML tags,which reference the ad files, being embedded into the web page filesthemselves. Such a tag specifies when and where, within the page, anadvertisement is to appear.

To surmount the latency problems inherent in such banner-likeadvertisements, various proprietary media formats have appeared in theart. These formats employ increasingly sophisticated data compression,sometimes in conjunction with video and/or audio streaming. Rather thanwaiting for a media file to fully download prior to its being rendered,streaming permits content in a “streamed” media file to be presented inreal-time to the user as that content arrives at his(her) clientbrowser. While this approach clearly provides enhanced richness incontent over that obtainable through a conventional banner and thus canheighten a “user experience”, it nevertheless relies, to its detriment,on a continuous real-time network connection existing to a remote webserver.

Unfortunately, any network or server congestion which stops thedownload, even if temporary, can suspend, i.e., freeze, or totally haltthe “streamed” media presentation to the user prior to its completion.This interruption, if noticeable and sufficiently long, will likelyfrustrate the user and degrade the “user experience”.

In spite of these drawbacks, particularly with respect to interstitialadvertisements and push technology, and apparently for lack of a betteralternative, most web advertising currently in use employs real-timestreaming of graphic files with their content being rendered by thebrowser.

Web advertisements, like other forms of mass advertising, do generaterevenue, often in the form of an on-going stream of payments to the hostof the ads, in this case web site owners. Accurate user accounting isessential to ensure that an advertiser is not over- or under-chargedgiven an extent to which an ad is actually disseminated. Hence, thesepayments are often tied to a function of the number of web users whomthe ad reached. But with web advertisements, accurately ascertainingthat number has been difficult and problematic at best, and, given abasic technique employed to do so, manifestly error-prone, therebycausing unreliable user counts and erroneous ad charges.

In particular and as conventionally employed, delivery of a webadvertisement, such as, e.g., a streamed ad, is logged as a “userimpression” at a web server at an instant an advertising file(s), e.g.,a streamed file, is served, rather than after the browser has completelyrendered the advertisement to the user. Unfortunately, serving these adfiles does not guarantee that these files will be ultimately andcompletely rendered by a client browser to a user. Consequently, webserver generated “user impression” counts can be grossly over- orunder-stated. For example, if a user navigates to a new content pageafter an advertisement has started playing but before that advertisementcompletes and, by doing so, prematurely terminated the advertisement, afull impression is nevertheless logged—erroneously—since thatadvertisement was completely served. Additional errors arise if a proxyserver is situated between multiple client PCs situated on an intranetor a local area network (LAN) and a web advertisement server situated onthe Internet (or other insecure public network). In this case, a requestfrom one of the client PCs for the advertisement files will be routed tothe proxy server, which, in turn, will direct that request onward to theadvertisement web server. The latter, in response to the request, willserve one complete copy of the advertisement files to the proxy server.The resulting fetched advertisement files will be locally cached in theproxy server and, from there, provided to the requesting client PC.Should any of the other client PCs request the same files, the proxyserver will provide these files, totally unbeknownst to the web server,from its local cache rather than directing a request from that other PCback to the web server. Hence, the web server will be totally obliviousto each additional instance in which the proxy server accessed the adfiles from its local cache and disseminated the advertisement to anyclient PC other than that which first requested the ad. Inasmuch as someintranets situated behind a proxy server(s) can be rather extensive withtens or hundreds of thousands of individual client PCs, server-baseduser impression accounting based on copies delivered by a web servermay, owing to the presence of proxy servers, be inordinately low andresult in significant under-charges to the advertiser. As of yet, nosolution apparently exists in the art that can provide accurate countsof “user impressions” of web advertisements.

Other conventional approaches aimed at reducing latency times associatedwith downloading content files through relatively slow speedcommunication links, e.g., modem connections, have involved developmentand use of new facilities within various programming languages. Theseapproaches, most notably involving the Java and JavaScript programminglanguages, while helpful, still cause inefficient use of available linkbandwidth and still constrain the size of the content files. Theselimitations arise from premature terminations of preloaded fileswhenever a user transitions to a new web page. Specifically, with theseapproaches, if a user activates a hotlink to transition to a new webpage while an ad file is being downloaded but before the downloading hascompleted, then the downloading simply stops. The downloading will needto be re-started, but from the beginning of the file, the next time thatparticular ad file is requested. Hence, the time and bandwidth that hasthen been expended in downloading part of that ad file is completelywasted. In practice, many users tend to quickly navigate through aseries of web pages until they reach a desired destination.Consequently, advertisers are constrained to again minimize content filesizes and hence “richness” of their advertisements in an effort todecrease a number of premature terminations per unit time and in doingso reduce latency caused by downloading duplicate sections of the samead file. Therefore, these approaches have generally proven to be whollyunsatisfactory.

In view of the fundamental drawbacks associated with various web basedadvertising techniques known in the art, interstitial web advertisingappears to hold the most promise of all these techniques. Yet, thelimitations inherent in conventional implementations of interstitialadvertising have effectively prevented this form of web advertising fromeffectively fulfilling its promise. Moreover, the deficiencies inherentin all known web advertising techniques have, to a significant extent,collectively inhibited the use of web advertising in general.

Thus, a pressing need exists in the art for a new web-based interstitialadvertising technique which does not suffer from infirmities associatedwith such interstitial advertising techniques known in the art.

In that regard, this new technique should preferably not embedadvertising HTML files within a web page. If this could be accomplished,then advantageously such a technique would likely provide considerableeconomies to advertisers in saved labor, time and cost in terms of bothinserting advertisements into web page files, and later changing any ofthose advertisements. In addition, such a new technique shouldpreferably function in a manner that is substantially, if not totally,transparent to a user and which neither inconveniences nor burdens thatuser. In particular, this new technique should preferably not require auser to download and install on his(her) PC a separate applicationprogram, let alone any update to it, specifically to receive webadvertising, or perform any affirmative act, other than normal webbrowsing, to receive such advertising. Furthermore, this new techniqueshould preferably be platform independent and, by doing so, operate withsubstantially any web browser on substantially any PC. Also, this newtechnique, when in use, should preferably not consume excessive harddisk space on a client PC. Moreover, to provide a pleasing “userexperience”, this new technique should render an ad fully and withoutany interruptions that might otherwise result from network and/or servercongestion. Lastly, this new technique should provide proper accountingto an advertiser by accurately and validly ascertaining user impressionsof fully rendered advertisements.

We believe that if such a new web-based interstitial advertisingtechnique could be provided, then this technique, which should be botheffective and desirable, may well achieve broad support and use byadvertisers and acceptance by web users; hence, substantially expandingthe use of web-based advertising in general.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

Advantageously, our present inventive technique satisfies this need byovercoming the deficiencies associated with conventional web-basedinterstitial advertising techniques.

Our present invention accomplishes this, in accordance with our broadinventive teachings, by: completely “decoupling” advertising contentfrom a web content page (also hereinafter referred to as a “referring”page); “politely” downloading advertising files, through a browserexecuting at a client computer, into browser caches (e.g., browser diskand RAM cache) at that computer and in a manner that is transparent to auser situated at the browser; and interstitially displayingadvertisements through the browser in response to a user click-streamassociated with normal user navigation across different web pages.

Specifically, our technique relies on embedding an HTML tag (which,where necessary, to distinguish this tag from other HTML tags, will alsobe referred to hereinafter as an “advertising tag”) into a referringpage. This tag contains two components. One component effectivelydownloads, from a distribution HTTP (web) server and to an extentnecessary, and then persistently instantiates an agent, implemented as a“light-weight” Java applet, at the client browser. This agent then“politely” and transparently downloads advertising files (media and,where necessary, player files), originating from an ad management systemresiding on a third-party advertising HTTP (web) server, for a givenadvertisement into browser disk cache (also in the case of media filesinto the browser RAM cache) and subsequently plays those media filesthrough the browser on an interstitial basis and in response to a userclick-stream. The other component is a reference, in terms of a webaddress, of the advertising management system from which the advertisingfiles are to be downloaded. This latter reference totally “decouples”advertising content from a web page such that a web page, rather thanembedding actual advertising content within the page itself—asconventionally occurs, merely includes an advertising tag that refers,via a URL, to a specific ad management system rather than to aparticular advertisement or its content. The ad management systemselects the given advertisement that is to be downloaded, rather thanhaving that selection or its content being embedded in the web contentpage.

Advantageously, the agent operates independently, in the client browser,of the content in any referring web page. Once loaded and started, theagent executes in parallel, with standard browser functionality,continually and transparently requesting and downloading advertisementsto browser cache residing in a client computer (e.g., personalcomputer—PC) and interstitially playing those advertisements.

In particular, once the agent is started, the agent politely andtransparently downloads, through the client browser and to the browsercache, both media and player files, originating from the advertisementmanagement server, for an advertisement that are needed to fully playcontent in that advertisement. The agent also monitors a click-streamgenerated by a user who then operates the browser. In response to auser-initiated action, e.g., a mouse click, which instructs the clientbrowser to transition to a next successive content web page and whichsignifies a start of an interstitial interval, the agent, if all themedia and player files are then resident on the client hard disk, playsthe media files, through the browser and during that interstitialinterval, directly from the browser cache. Advertisements areinterstitially played typically in the order in which they weredownloaded to the client browser. Interstitial play from browser cacheadvantageously permits previously cached content rich advertisements tobe played through the browser without adversely affecting communicationlink bandwidth then available to the client browser. Thus, the fullavailable link bandwidth can be used, while an advertisement is beingplayed, to download a next successive content web page.

Employing a user click-stream to trigger play of cached advertisementsfrees the user, for receiving advertising, of any need either toundertake any affirmative action, other than normal web browsing, or tolearn any new procedure; thus, advantageously imposing no added burdenon the user.

Advantageously, the agent “politely” downloads advertisement media andplayer files, originating from the advertising server, to the browsercache, during what otherwise would be browser idle times, i.e., while aweb page is being displayed to a user and the browser is waiting foruser input. Caching advertisement files in this fashion advantageouslycircumvents variable latency and erratic (e.g., intermittent orsuspended) play that frequently occurs with conventional streamed andstatic media delivered over the web.

At the start of an interstitial interval, the agent determines whetherall the media and player files required to play a given advertisement(typically that having its so-called AdDescriptor file situated in ahead of a play queue) then reside on the disk of the client PC or, withrespect to media files, are resident in browser RAM cache. If so, theagent then accesses these files from the disk to “play” thatadvertisement. Since all the media and player files are then locallyresident, the advertisement, from a user's perspective, is immediatelyrendered from the client hard disk or browser RAM cache with essentiallyno downloading delay, thus providing a highly pleasing “user experience”with rich multi-media content approaching that obtainable throughcurrent CD-ROM based delivery. Thereafter, the agent returns control tothe browser to permit the browser, if a next successive web page hasbeen downloaded, assembled and ready to be rendered, to render thatparticular page to the user. If, however, an advertisement isprematurely terminated by a user, that advertisement (in terms of itsAdDescriptor file) will remain in a play queue (with its media andplayer files remaining on the client hard disk or, in the case of mediafiles, in browser RAM cache) and will be re-played from its beginning atthe start of a next successive interstitial interval. Furthermore, ifdownload of the media and player files for an advertisement were to beinterrupted by a user click-stream, i.e., start of interstitialinterval, the agent suspends further downloading until after the ensuinginterstitial interval terminates. To conserve communication linkbandwidth, the agent then resumes downloading of these files at a pointit was suspended, rather than, as conventionally occurs, totallyre-starting the download.

In accordance with our specific inventive teachings, the agent containstwo applets: a Transition Sensor applet and an “AdController” applet.Only the Transition Sensor applet is itself associated with any contentpage. Though the AdController applet, once started, executes under thebrowser, it is not under the control of the browser itself.

The advertising tag is itself embedded in a content web page. Theadvertising tag, as one of its components, references a JavaScript file(which contains a “script”) stored on a distribution server. TheJavaScript file, when executed, downloads and implements, throughdynamic writing of applet tags, the Transition Sensor applet. Thisparticular applet remains visually transparent to a user who displays,with his(her) browser, the HTML coding for that page. Specifically, whenthe JavaScript file is downloaded and the script it contains is thenexecuted by the browser, the script dynamically writes a predefinednumber and combination of applet tags, i.e., which collectively form theTransition Sensor applet, into the retrieved web page content in lieu ofthe advertising tag. Subsequent execution of these tags, by the clientbrowser, invokes the Transition Sensor applet. As discussed, theadvertising tag also, as the other of its components, encapsulates areference, i.e., a URL to a specific ad management server, typicallysited on a third party advertising server, containing specific media,that collectively constitutes web advertisements, and accompanyingplayer files.

In particular, when executed, the Transition Sensor applet instantiatesan Applet Registry, which is used for inter-applet communication.Thereafter, the Transition Sensor applet determines whether theAdController applet has been downloaded to the browser disk cache orwhether an updated version of this particular applet resides on adistribution server. If an updated version of this applet exists on thedistribution server relative to that previously downloaded to thebrowser disk cache or if this applet has not been download at all ontothis cache, the Transition Sensor applet loads the AdController appletfrom the distribution server into the browser disk cache. The TransitionSensor applet then instantiates the AdController applet. Once thisoccurs, the Transition Sensor applet then establishes appropriateentries in the Applet Registry for itself and the AdController applet.

The Transition Sensor applet then passes the URL of the ad managementsystem, as specified in the advertising tag, to the AdController appletin order for the latter applet to request delivery of an advertisement,specifically an associated AdDescriptor file, originating from thatsystem. The system then selects the advertisement to be delivered and,via the third party advertising server, so informs the AdControllerapplet by returning the requested AdDescriptor file. For a givenadvertisement, this particular file, which is textual in nature,contains a manifest, i.e., a list, of: file names and corresponding webaddresses of all media files that constitute content for thatadvertisement and all player files necessary to play all the mediafiles; an order in which the various media files are to be played; andvarious configuration and other parameters need to configure and operatethe operation of each player in order for it to properly play acorresponding media file(s). The AdController then “politely” downloads,typically via the advertising distribution server, the associated mediaand player files, as specified in the AdDescriptor file—and to theextent they do not already reside on the hard disk of the client PC. Asnoted above, the Transition Sensor applet also monitors a click-streamproduced by the current user to detect a user-initiated page transitionand hence the start of an interstitial interval.

Advantageously, the AdDescriptor file implements a data abstraction thattotally separates the media and player files from the referring web pagethus assuring that the advertisement content itself remains completelyindependent of the content web page that invoked its presentation. Thisabstraction permits our technique to provide a highly effective,generalized and very flexible mechanism for delivering rich webadvertisements, particularly those that require complex sets of mediafiles and players. Through use of this abstraction, our technique isable to handle present and future media formats, regardless of theirrequirements, including proprietary streaming and other content deliverytechnologies that rely on Java applets as a delivery mechanism—alltransparently to the user. Moreover, since the AdDescriptor file canspecify media and player files for different browsers, operating systemsand computing platforms then in use, our technique can readily functionwith a wide variety of different computing and browsing platforms.

The Transition Sensor and AdController applets are each implementedthrough appropriate Java classes and collectively persist, throughstorage in the browser disk cache, across different content pages withina site, across different web sites, and across successive browsersessions. Once either of these applets is completely downloaded,providing it is not subsequently flushed from the browser disk cache asthe user navigates across web sites on the web, the files for thatapplet will be loaded from that cache, rather than being downloaded fromthe distribution server, the next time that applet is required, e.g.,when the user next navigates, either during a current browser session ora subsequent session, to any content page that contains an advertisingtag.

Whenever the client browser encounters a next successive page containingan advertising tag, then the browser will first and automaticallyinquire with the distribution server to ensure that executable code forthe Transition Sensor applet, if previously downloaded into the browserdisk cache, has not been superseded by an updated version. If such anupdated version then exists, the browser will collectively downloadupdated files from the distribution server and replace, to the extentnecessary, each Transition Sensor applet file residing in the browserdisk cache with its updated version. Alternatively, if the TransitionSensor applet has not been previously downloaded into the browser diskcache, then the browser will download all the necessary files for theTransition Sensor applet from the distribution server into that cache.The Transition Sensor applet, once executing, will load, through thebrowser, the AdController applet. To do so, the browser will, ifnecessary, obtain an updated version, from the distribution server, inthe same manner as it did for the Transition Sensor. As a result, anycorrections or enhancements made to the agent (specifically theTransition Sensor and/or the AdController applets) since the agent waslast downloaded to the client browser will be automatically andtransparently, from a user perspective, distributed to that browser anddownloaded into the browser disk cache the next time the browserencounters a web page containing an advertising tag. By operating inthis fashion, the user is totally and advantageously relieved of anyneed to: both initially load and install an application program toobtain advertising and/or later update that program.

Furthermore, the agent advantageously persists and functionstransparently in background, independent and transparent to usernavigation across pages on a common web site and across web sites. Theagent effectively implements a background process which runs in parallelwith and is transparent to normal HTML and HTTP operations implementedby the client browser.

Moreover, in sharp contrast to conventional server-based accounting ofweb advertisements, our inventive technique provides highly accurateclient-side accounting of each user impression. Each log entry, producedby the AdController applet, specifies a successful presentation of acomplete advertisement at a client browser. This entry may include asource of the ad content, i.e., in terms of the URL of the associated admanagement system, a title of the advertisement and the URL of thereferring web page. Other client-side information can be measured andincluded in each entry, such as: an amount of time during which theadvertisement was rendered by the browser (presumably during which theuser dwelled on the advertisement); as well as an identification, interms of a URL, of a content web page to which the user next navigated(particularly if the user reached that page through a hotlink displayedin the advertisement). Subsequently, the AdController applet uploads thelog entries to the advertising server. These entries will becollectively processed, as needed, to permit shared ad revenues fromweb-based advertisers to be properly allocated among different web pagecontent providers.

Advantageously, our inventive technique, by totally decoupling referringweb page content from its corresponding advertising content, easilypermits an advertiser to change or update any of its advertisements byjust modifying, as needed, appropriate media and AdDescriptor files thatreside in the third-party advertising management system. Since areferring web page merely incorporates an advertising tag totally devoidof advertising content, no changes whatsoever need to be made to thatpage. Hence, use of our inventive technique substantially reduces theburden, time and cost associated with maintaining and updating web-basedadvertising over that conventionally required.

As a feature, our inventive technique advantageously implements, inconjunction with its persistent agent approach, multi-threadedpipelining. By processing each different advertisement as a differentthread, each one of a sequence of different processing operations can beperformed, effectively on a pipe-lined parallel basis, on differentsequentially occurring advertisements, thereby enhancing a rate(increasing throughput) at which advertisements can be queued forplayback. In addition, through such pipe-lining, logging of a fullypresented advertisement can occur as a last operation in a pipeline andessentially in parallel either with: presentation of cachedadvertisement having its AdDescriptor file situated in the play queueimmediately behind that for the just presented advertisement, ordownloading and caching of a next successive advertisement.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The teachings of the present invention can be readily understood byconsidering the following detailed description in conjunction with theaccompanying drawings, in which:

FIG. 1A depicts the correct alignment of the drawing sheets for FIGS. 1Band 1C;

FIGS. 1B and 1C collectively depict a high-level block diagram of anillustrative client-server distributed processing environment,implemented through the Internet, which embodies the teachings of ourpresent invention, along with, as pertinent to the invention, basicinter-computer actions that occur in that environment and associatedclient processing operations;

FIG. 1D depicts the correct alignment of the drawing sheets for FIGS. 1Eand 1F;

FIGS. 1E and 1F collectively depict the same environment as shown inFIGS. 1B and 1C but showing a detailed version of agentdownload/instantiate/execute operations 50 shown in the latter figures;

FIG. 2 depicts the correct alignment of the drawing sheets for FIGS. 2Aand 2B;

FIGS. 2A and 2B collectively depict generalized web page HTML code 35,specifically inclusion of advertising tag 40, which transparentlyinvokes our invention, and changes which our invention dynamically makesto that code, specifically substitution of Transition Sensor applet 210for tag 40 to yield page 35′, in order to download and render webadvertisements;

FIG. 3 depicts a high-level block diagram of client PC 5 shown in FIGS.1B and 1C, and 1E and 1F;

FIG. 4 depicts a simplified high-level block diagram of applicationprograms 400 resident within client PC 5 shown in FIG. 3;

FIG. 5 depicts a high-level block diagram of AdController agent 420shown in FIG. 4, which implements our present invention;

FIG. 6 depicts the correct alignment of the drawing sheets for FIGS. 6Aand 6B;

FIGS. 6A and 6B collectively depict a high-level flowchart of processingoperations 600 performed by AdController agent 420 shown in FIG. 5;

FIG. 7 depicts a high-level block diagram of basic processing threadsthat implement AdController applet 424 which, as shown in FIG. 4, formspart of AdController agent 420;

FIG. 8 depicts a high-level flowchart of processing operations 800performed by AdController applet 424 shown in FIG. 7;

FIG. 9 depicts the correct alignment of the drawing sheets for FIGS. 9Aand 9B;

FIGS. 9A and 9B collectively depict a flowchart of processing operations900 performed by AdController applet 424, shown in FIG. 7, specificallyfor processing an advertisement;

FIG. 10 depicts inter-applet events that occur within AdController agent420 during execution of Transition Sensor applet 422;

FIG. 11 depicts a high-level block diagram of basic processing threadsthat implement Transition Sensor applet 422 which, as shown in FIG. 4,forms part of AdController agent 420;

FIG. 12 depicts a high-level flowchart of processing operations 1200performed by Transition Sensor applet 422 shown in FIG. 11;

FIG. 13 depicts a high-level block diagram of Ad Loader process 1300which can be used to provide advertiser control over various functions,for advertisement play and logging, implemented by AdController applet424;

FIG. 14 depicts a high-level block diagram of Ad Pipeline 545 that isimplemented by and forms part of AdController applet 424 shown in FIG.4;

FIG. 15 depicts a high-level block diagram of Ad Producer process 1500that is executed by Ad Pipeline 545 shown in FIG. 14;

FIG. 16 depicts a high-level block diagram of Ad Location process 1600that is also executed by Ad Pipeline 545 shown in FIG. 14;

FIG. 17 depicts a high-level block diagram of Ad Downloader process 1700that is also executed by Ad Pipeline 545 shown in FIG. 14;

FIG. 18 depicts a flowchart of stop method 1800 invoked by TransitionSensor applet 422 shown in FIG. 4;

FIG. 19 depicts a flowchart of start method 1900 invoked by TransitionSensor applet 422 shown in FIG. 4; and

FIG. 20 depicts contents of actual illustrative AdDescriptor file 2000for use in interstitially rendering a PointCast type Java advertisementthrough our present invention.

To facilitate understanding, identical reference numerals have beenused, where possible, to designate identical elements that are common tothe figures.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

After considering the following description, those skilled in the artwill clearly realize that the teachings of our present invention can beutilized in any networked client-server environment in which advertisingor other information is to be presented to a user during interstitialintervals, i.e., during a transition between successively displayed webpages. Such an environment can encompass the Internet or an intranet, orany client-server environment in which a client browser (regardless ofwhether that browser executes on a dedicated client computer or not) isused to access and download web pages or, more generally speaking, filesthrough a network communication channel (link) from a server (againregardless of whether that server executes on a dedicated computer ornot). In that regard, the server can be a separate software applicationwhich executes on any computer in the networked environment, even ifthat computer is itself a client to another server in the network.

For purposes of simplicity and to facilitate reader understanding, wewill discuss our present invention in the illustrative context of use inrendering interstitial web-based advertisements to a client personalcomputer (PC) connected to the Internet, where specifically a clientbrowser executing in the PC is used to download and render web pagesfrom a remote networked Internet accessible web server. Clearly, afterconsidering the ensuing description, anyone skilled in the art willreadily appreciate how the teachings of our invention can be easilyincorporated into any client-server or other similar distributedprocessing environment in which a client can encompass not only aspecific computer connected to a network but a software process thatpossesses network connectivity to another such process and requestsinformation from and, in response, obtains information supplied by thelatter.

We will first present an overview of our invention, particularly in thecontext of its use with an Internet web browser in a client PC, followedby describing each basic component of its implementation.

A. Overview

A general deployment of our invention in an Internet environment iscollectively shown in FIGS. 1B and 1C, with a detailed view of a portionof the inter-processor agent download/instantiation operations 50 shownin these figures being depicted in FIGS. 1E and 1F. The correctalignment of the drawing sheets for FIGS. 1B and 1C, and 1E and 1F isshown in FIGS. 1A and 1D, respectively. FIGS. 2A and 2B, for which thecorrect alignment of the drawing sheets for these figures is shown inFIG. 2, collectively depicts generalized web page HTML code whichtransparently invokes our invention, and changes which our inventiondynamically makes to that code in order to download and render webadvertisements. For a understanding, the reader should simultaneouslyrefer to FIGS. 1B and 1C, 1E and 1F, and 2A and 2B throughput thefollowing discussion.

As shown, client PC 5, upon which client browser 7 executes, isconnected through communication link 9 to Internet 10. Browser 7 is aconventional web browser, such as Internet Explorer or NetscapeNavigator commercially available from Microsoft Corporation or NetscapeCorporation, respectively. Preferably, for reasons that will shortlybecome clear, that browser should preferably support dynamic writing ofapplet tags. Though, for ease of illustrating inter-computer actions, wedepicted Internet 10 as having portions 10 _(A) and 10 _(B), we willcollectively refer to both portions as simply Internet 10. Web server13, connected, via link 11, to Internet 10 represents any web HTTP(hypertext transfer protocol) server. This server, in response to arequest from web browser 7 to fetch a specific file, downloads thatfile, using conventional TCP/IP protocols (transmission controlprotocols/internet protocols), through the Internet to browser 7.Browser 7 will, in turn, render that file typically on a monitor to auser situated at the client PC.

Advertising distribution HTTP server (also referred to as “agent”server) 15 is connected, via communications link 17, to Internet 10 andstores files that collectively implement a predefined agent,specifically, a light weight Java applet. This agent (referred to hereinas the “AdController” agent) transparently pre-loads itself, as well asmedia rich advertising content, into a local hard disk cache associatedwith the browser (“browser disk cache”) on client PC 5. Server 15downloads the AdController agent in a manner to be described below, toclient browser 7. This agent, once instantiated and started, thentransparently and politely downloads (actually pre-loads) advertisementsinto the browser disk cache, and subsequently plays each of thoseadvertisements, on an interstitial basis, in response to a click streamgenerated by the user as (s)he navigates, through use of browser 7,between successive web pages. Such hard disk caching advantageouslycircumvents variable latency and erratic play associated withconventional streamed and static media delivered over the Internet. Theagent enables rich advertising to be presented in a highly-controlledfashion, resulting in user experiences approaching that of CD-ROM.

Third-party ad HTTP server 20, connected to Internet 10 via, e.g.,communications links 18 and 23, hosts ad management system 25. Inessence and as discussed in detail below, this system, in response to arequest originating from the AdController agent executing in browser 7,selects a given advertisement and then downloads, in a “polite” mannercontrolled by the agent, media and player files that form thatadvertisement to the agent for storage in the browser disk cache.Inasmuch as Java applets are currently restricted under constraintsinherent in the Java programming language itself to retrieving filesfrom an identical Internet host that served the applet itself, therequest for an advertisement to system 25 as well as resulting media andplayer files served by system 25 are routed through agent server 15 as aproxy server.

Advantageously, our inventive technique completely “decouples”advertising content from a web content page (also hereinafter referredto as a “referring” page). This, in turn, permits our technique torender media-rich advertisements without requiring inclusion of anyadvertising content into a referring web page. This “decoupling” iseffectuated through inclusion of an HTML tag into a content web page,which when the latter is downloaded, interpreted and executed by thebrowser, effectively loads and instantiates the agent and then retrievesadvertisement files from an ad management system specified in the tag.Thus, advertising files (both media and player files) can be maintainedtotally independently of their referring web page(s), withadvantageously any changes made to the former having no effect on HTMLcoding contained in the latter.

In particular, HTML tag 40 (which, where necessary, to distinguish thistag from other HTML tags, will also be referred to hereinafter as an“advertising tag”) is embedded by a content provider(s) into HTML codethat constitutes each referring web page, e.g., here page 35. Generally,the position of this tag relative to existing HTML code (shown as HTMLcode portions 35 _(A) and 35 _(B) in FIGS. 2A and 2B) for this page isnot critical. Advantageously, very rarely, if ever at all, do anychanges need to be made to these code portions to accommodate the tag.As shown and as reproduced in Table 1 below, this tag, which typicallyconsumes one line in a web page, implements a script.

TABLE 1 ADVERTISING TAG <SCRIPT SRC = http: //unicast.com/loadad.js>AdServer = “http: //AdManagement system” </SCRIPT>

One portion of the advertising tag (“SRC=http://unicast.com/loadad.js”),when executed by the browser, downloads a JavaScript file (named“loadad.js”) from the agent server. This file, in turn, is theninterpreted and executed, as a script, by the browser. The effect ofexecuting this script, as symbolized by block 200 shown in FIGS. 2A and2B, is to substitute applet tags, dynamically written by the script,into the referring web page in lieu of advertising tag 40 so as to forma modified web page, here referring content page 35′, residing in thebrowser disk cache. The script, by invoking a feature associated withdynamic writing, completely hides these tags from view should the userthen display HTML source code for page 35′ with his browser. This, inturn, hinders the user, to a certain degree, from readily ascertainingthe source of the agent and ad management systems. Collectively, theseapplet tags form Transition Sensor applet 210. This script, as describedin detail below and is reproduced in Table 2 below, when interpreted andexecuted by a Java virtual machine (Java interpreter) resident in thebrowser persistently loads and then instantiates the Transition Sensoritself which, in turn, loads and instantiates the remainder of the agentin the client browser.

TABLE 2 TRANSITION SENSOR APPLET <appletcode=“com.unicast.adcontroller.tools.TransitionSensor”codebase=“http://www.unicast.com/java/classes/” align=“baseline”width=“0” height=“0” name=“TransitionSensor” archive=“adcontroller.jar”><param name=“adURL”value=“http://www.unicast.com/media/fireworks_01_ad_descriptor.txt”><param name=“cabbase” value=“adcontroller.cab”> </applet>

The value of attribute CODE in the Transition Sensor applet specifies aJava executable that will be executed by the client browser, when itrenders this applet, to launch the Transition Sensor. The executable,implemented through an appropriate Java class, was originally compiledfrom its associated Java source code file. Tags labeled “<WIDTH>” and“<HEIGHT>” jointly specify a rectangular portion of a web page, asdisplayed by browser 7, in which the applet will be rendered. Since,here that portion is non-existent, nothing will be rendered. Applets,such as this one, can be delivered transparently over the Internet tothe client PC and require no user-assisted installation.

Another portion of the advertising tag(“AdServer=”http://AdManagement_system”) references a URL of aparticular ad management system (where “AdManagement_system” representsa web address (URL) of that particular system), here illustrativelysystem 25, from which the agent is to download an advertisement. As willbe seen below, the Transition Sensor applet, during its execution,passes this URL, as part of an advertising download request, to theremainder of the AdController agent to subsequently download appropriateadvertising files, also as described below, from that system necessaryto interstitially play an advertisement.

If advertisements are to play on client browsers (specifically MicrosoftInternet Explorer version 3) that do not support dynamic writing ofapplet tags, then applet 210 would need to be inserted by contentproviders into each referring web page in lieu of advertising tag 40.Unfortunately, Transition Sensor applet 210 identifies both the agentserver, and an actual advertisement in terms of a URL of its sourcecomponents (through contents of an “AdDescriptor” file—which will bediscussed in detail below—specified in this applet). Since browsertechnology continues to rapidly advance with most users continuallyupgrading their browsers, most browsers now in use, and in a very shorttime nearly all such browsers, will support such dynamic writing. Hence,we see little, and very shortly essentially no need, to embed applet 210into any referring web pages, thus minimizing ad insertion cost, effortand time while restricting disclosure of the agent server andadvertisement source information.

The agent, during its execution, “politely” and transparently downloadsadvertising files (media, and where necessary player files), originatingfrom ad management system 25 for a given advertisement into browser diskcache (with the media files also being written into browser RAM cache)and subsequently plays those media files through the browser on aninterstitial basis and in response to the user click-stream.

Advantageously, the agent operates independently, in the client browser,of the content in any referring web page. Once loaded and started, theagent executes in parallel, with standard browser functionality,continually and transparently requesting and downloading advertisementsto a browser disk cache residing on a local hard disk (“browser diskcache”), as well as in the case of media files into browser RAM cache,in a client computer (e.g., personal computer—PC) and interstitiallyplaying those advertisements.

Now, with the above in mind and specific reference to FIGS. 1B and 1C,we will now describe the basic inter-computer actions associated withuse of our invention, as well as the basic attendant processing stepsthat occur in the client PC.

To begin a browsing session, the user first invokes client browser 7.Once the browser is executing, the browser obtains, as an initial webpage—selection of this page being referenced by numeral 31, an addresseither of a prior so-called “default” content page previously specifiedby the user and having its URL stored in the browser or of a contentpage manually entered by the user. The client browser then issues, assymbolized by block 33, a request to fetch a file for that page; withthe request containing a URL of that page (i.e., its complete webaddress including its file name). We assume for simplicity that the filefor that page resides on web server 13. We also assume that page 35 isbeing requested which will invoke an associated interstitialadvertisement in accordance with our invention. In response to therequest routed to server 13—as symbolized by line 34, this particularserver downloads, as symbolized by line 36, to client PC 5 a file forpage 35, where the coding stored in this file contains advertisement tag40. Illustrative contents of this tag are shown in dashed block 45, aswell as in FIGS. 2A and 2B.

Once this file is received as shown in FIGS. 1B and 1C, browser 7interprets and then executes, as symbolized by block 52, the HTML codein page 35, which includes tag 40 and thus undertakes the actions shownin agent download/instantiate/execute operations 50. These operationseventually result in the AdController agent being downloaded,instantiated and started in the client browser. Generally speaking, thebrowser in response to executing the advertising tag, issues a request,as symbolized by line 54, to agent server 15 to download theAdController agent. Through various inter-process operations, as shownin further detail in FIGS. 1E and 1F and which will be described belowshortly, server 15 accesses and downloads, as symbolized by line 56, theneeded files to install the AdController agent to execute under browser7 on the client PC. Once files for the agent are downloaded to thebrowser disk cache on the client PC, the browser then instantiates andstarts the agent executing, as symbolized by block 58. Operations 50effectively conclude once the agent begins executing.

Now referring to operations 50 as shown in further detail in FIGS. 1Eand 1F, upon entry into these operations, browser 7 executes, assymbolized by block 110, advertising tag 40. The browser then issues arequest, as symbolized by line 115, to agent server 15, to download aJavaScript file (named, e.g., “loadad.js”) specified in the request.This file is specified as the first portion of the advertising tag. Inresponse to this request, server 15 downloads, as symbolized by line120, this particular file onto browser 7 where that file is cachedappropriately. Once the file is fully downloaded, it is interpreted andexecuted by a Java virtual machine (a Java interpreter integrated intothe browser and which generates code compatible with and executable bythe browser). As indicated by block 125, the browser then executes theinterpreted code for the script which, in turn, dynamically writesapplet tags —in the manner generally shown in FIGS. 2A and 2B anddescribed above—into web page 35 in lieu of the advertising tag. Thesetags, which collectively form Transition Sensor applet 210, include areference to a specific ad management system as specified in the secondportion of advertising tag 40.

Once these tags are dynamically written into content web page 35 (toyield modified version 35′ shown in FIGS. 2A and 2B), Transition Sensorapplet 210 is instantiated and then executed. In particular, browser 7determines whether executable code for the Transition Sensor applet hasbeen previously downloaded to the browser disk cache. If this code hasnot been downloaded or an updated version of this code exists on agentserver 15, the browser issues, as symbolized by line 130, a request todownload a latest version of the Transition Sensor executable code fromthe agent server. Server 15, in response to this request, downloads, assymbolized by line 135, file(s) for the latest version of the transitionsensor code to the browser which, in turn, stores these file(s) into thebrowser disk cache. Thereafter as symbolized by block 140, the browserinstantiates and starts execution of the Transition Sensor applet. Thislatter applet, as part of its initial execution, instantiates an AppletRegistry. This registry provides a mechanism, within the agent, forinter-applet communication between the constituent Transition Sensor andAdController applets.

Thereafter, the Transition Sensor applet attempts to load, also assymbolized by block 140, the AdController applet, through the browser,from the browser disk cache. To do so, the browser first determineswhether the AdController applet has been downloaded to the browser diskcache or whether an updated version of this particular applet resides onagent server 15. If an updated version of this applet exists on theagent server relative to that previously downloaded to the browser diskcache or if the AdController applet has not been download at all intothis cache, the browser issues a request, as symbolized by line 150, todownload a latest version of the AdController applet from agent server15. Server 15, in response to this request, downloads, as symbolized byline 155, file(s) for the latest version of the AdController applet tothe client browser which, in turn, stores these file(s) into the browserdisk cache. Lastly, as symbolized by block 160, the Transition Sensorapplet then instantiates and starts the AdController applet; andthereafter establishes appropriate entries in the Applet Registry foritself and the AdController applet.

Returning to FIGS. 1B and 1C, once operations 50 have completed, suchthat the agent is executing under browser 7, the AdController appletissues, as symbolized by block 60, a request, via agent server 15, todownload an AdDescriptor file from the ad management system, e.g., admanagement system 25, specified in advertising tag 40. This requestcontains the URL of the ad management system contained in advertisingtag 40. Currently, Java applets are restricted under constraintsinherent in the Java programming language itself to retrieving filesfrom an identical Internet host that served the applet itself. As such,rather than directing this request to advertising server 20, on which admanagement system 25 resides, this request, as symbolized by line 62, isaddressed to agent server 15, which serves as a proxy server betweenclient PC 5 and advertising server 20. Both the request and resultingadvertising (including media and player) files will be served to theclient PC through agent server 15. As such, once the request has beenreceived by the agent server, this server passes the request onward, assymbolized by line 64, to advertising server 20.

In response to this request for an AdDescriptor file, ad managementsystem 25 then selects a specific advertisement to be delivered toclient PC 5. This selection can be selected on a predefined or randombasis, or based on user preference or other user-specific informationpreviously collected from and associated with the user then operatingbrowser 7. Such user-specific information, such as prior buyingpatterns, could have been appropriately pre-collected at the client PC,previously uploaded to ad management system 25 and processed there suchthat, upon receipt of the AdDescriptor request, system 25 would thenselect and download an appropriate advertisement specifically targetedto the user then situated at the client PC. In any event, once system 25selects the advertisement, through whatever selection metric it employs,the corresponding AdDescriptor file is then downloaded, as symbolized byline 66, to agent server 15 (here being a proxy server) which, in turn,as symbolized by line 68, supplies that file to the AdController agentthen executing under web browser 7.

To digress slightly, for the selected advertisement, the AdDescriptorfile is a text file that contains a manifest, i.e., a list, of filenames and corresponding network locations (URLs) at which these filesreside, and player instructions and configuration parameter valuesnecessary to play the entire advertisement through web browser 7 to theuser. FIG. 20 shows contents of typical AdDescriptor file 2000 for aPointCast Java advertisement. Specifically and as shown in section 4C offile 2000, this AdDescriptor file lists file names with partialaddresses on the ad management system of all media files that constitutecontent for that advertisement, and, in section 1 of this file, all Javaplayer files necessary to play all the media files. This file alsorespectively specifies, here shown in sections 3 and 4B, an order inwhich the various media files are to be played, and variousconfiguration parameters needed to properly configure the operation ofeach player to play each corresponding media file.

The AdDescriptor file implements a data abstraction that totallyseparates the media and player files from the referring web page, herepage 35, thus assuring that the advertisement content itself remainscompletely independent of the content web page that invoked itspresentation. This abstraction permits our technique to provide a highlyeffective, generalized and very flexible mechanism for delivering richweb advertisements, particularly those that require complex sets ofmedia files and players. Through use of this abstraction, our inventivetechnique can handle present and future media formats, regardless oftheir requirements, including proprietary streaming and other contentdelivery technologies that rely on Java applets as a deliverymechanism—all transparently to the user. Moreover, the AdDescriptor filecan contain separate listings (though not contained in file 2000 shownin FIG. 20) that delineate media and player files for differentbrowsers, client operating systems or computing platforms (to the extentany of these require different versions of the media and/or playerfiles) then in use. As such, our technique can readily function with awide variety of different client computers and browsing platforms.

Once the AdDescriptor file is downloaded to the client PC, via agentserver 15, the AdController then “politely” downloads, as symbolized byblock 70 shown in FIGS. 1B and 1C, into the browser disk cache eachmedia and player file, as specified in the AdDescriptor file—to theextent that file does not already reside on the hard disk of the clientPC. Through so-called “polite” downloading, media and player files aredownloaded to browser 7 during browser idle time intervals, with thedownloading suspended during each ensuing interstitial interval afterthe user instructs browser 7 to navigate to a new content web page. Inthis manner, while a fully downloaded advertisement is interstitiallyplayed from browser cache, the new content page is downloaded over thefull bandwidth of communications link 9. Advantageously, thecommunications link is freed during each interstitial interval to justcarry web page content, thereby expediting download of content pages.If, due to the occurrence of an interstitial interval, the AdControllerapplet suspends downloading of an advertisement file, then upontermination of this interval, this applet then resumes downloading at alocation in that file at which downloading had stopped, thus conservingcommunication bandwidth and reducing download time.

In particular, as part of the operations symbolized by block 70, theAdController applet determines which files, of those listed on theAdDescriptor, do not then reside on the hard disk of client PC 5. Onceit has made that determination, this applet issues a request, assymbolized by line 72, to agent server 15, to fetch a first one of thesefiles. The agent server, again serving as a proxy server, issues arequest, as symbolized by line 74, to fetch this file from a networkedserver, anywhere on Internet 10, on which that file resides. Forsimplicity, we assume that all such files reside on server 20 and areaccessible through ad management system 25. Hence, system 25, via server20, issues a response, as symbolized by line 76 to agent server 15,containing this first advertisement file. The agent server, in turn andas symbolized by line 78, downloads this particular file to clientbrowser 7 for storage in the browser disk cache. Downloading ofadvertisement files continues in this manner until, as symbolized byline 88, a last required file for the advertisement has been downloaded,via agent server 15, to the browser disk cache on client PC 5.

As the advertisement files for a common advertisement are beingdownloaded, the Transition Sensor applet also monitors, as symbolized inblock 90, a click-stream produced by the current user so as to detect auser-initiated page transition. Once such a transition occurs, usuallycaused by a user engendered mouse click, and hence an interstitialinterval starts, the AdController applet plays, also as symbolized byblock 90, a fully cached advertisement (assuming all its media andplayer files have been downloaded) in the manner specified in itsassociated AdDescriptor file and using the players specified therein.Also, at the inception of the interstitial interval, the browser issues,also as symbolized by block 90, a request to fetch the next successiveweb page to which the user desires to transition. Once the advertisementhas fully played, or until the next successive content web page is fullydownloaded and assembled, or a user has closed an advertisement window,whichever occurs first (assuming the AdDescriptor file specifies thatthe advertisement can be prematurely terminated), then control isreturned, as symbolized by path 94, to the client browser to awaitcompletion of the download and interpretation of HTML code that formsthat next content page and subsequent execution, of an advertising tagtherein to invoke agent download/instantiate/execute operations 50 forthat page; and so forth.

The Transition Sensor and AdController applets are each implementedthrough appropriate Java classes and collectively persist, throughstorage in the browser disk cache, across different content pages withina site, different web sites, and successive browser sessions. Onceeither of these applets is completely downloaded through operations 50,providing that applet is not subsequently flushed from the browser diskcache as the user navigates across web sites on the web, the files forthat applet will be loaded from that cache, rather than being downloadedfrom agent server 15, the next time that applet is required, e.g., whenthe user next navigates, either during a current browser session or asubsequent session, to any successive content page that containsadvertising tag 40.

Whenever client browser 7 encounters a next successive content pagecontaining advertising tag 40, then the browser, will first andautomatically inquire with agent server 15 to ensure that executablecode for the Transition Sensor applet, if previously downloaded into thebrowser disk cache, has not been superseded by an updated version. Ifsuch an updated version then exists, the browser will collectivelydownload updated files from the agent server and replace, to the extentnecessary, each Transition Sensor applet file residing in the browserdisk cache with its updated version. Alternatively, if the TransitionSensor applet has not been previously downloaded into the browser diskcache, then the browser will download all the necessary files for theTransition Sensor applet from the agent server into that cache. TheTransition Sensor applet, once executing, will load, through thebrowser, the AdController applet. To do so, the browser will, ifnecessary, obtain an updated version, from the agent server, in the samemanner as it did for the Transition Sensor. As a result, any correctionsor enhancements made to the agent (specifically the Transition Sensorand/or the AdController applets) since the agent was last downloaded tothe client browser will be automatically and transparently, from a userperspective, distributed to that browser and downloaded into that diskcache the next time the browser encounters a web page containing anadvertising tag. By operating in this fashion, the user is totally andadvantageously relieved of any need to: both initially load and installan application program to obtain advertising and/or later update thatprogram.

Specifically, cross page persistency of the Transition Sensor agent isaccomplished by using a Java “singleton” design. A singleton designallows only a single object to ever be created and is accomplished bydeclaring a Java class as static. Since all applets run in a sameinstance of a Java virtual machine, therefore all applets and theirassociated code share all static class variables. A static AppletRegistry class is instantiated automatically by the Transition Sensorapplet at its run time and, by implementing the Applet Registry,provides all inter-applet communication between the Transition Sensorand the AdController applets and their threads. The Applet Registryclass implements a “loadAdController” method which, in turn,instantiates the persistent AdController applet. Through this method,the Transition Sensor applet downloads the AdController applet only ifthe latter applet has either been updated, relative to that version ofthis applet then resident in the browser disk cache, or does not thenreside on the browser disk cache. The AdController applet theninstantiates all its own threads that collectively implement transparentadvertisement downloading and play mechanisms.

The AdController applet is itself created by an Applet Registrysingleton object and creates all other objects that collectivelyconstitute a run time agent execution module. This applet extendsstandard applet class definitions by over-riding standard Java appletinit (initialize), start, run, stop and destroy life cycle methods,conventionally implemented in the client browser, with correspondingsubstitute methods. The substitute stop method ensures that atraditional response provided by the browser of halting execution foreither the AdController applet does not occur whenever the browser callsthe stop method to terminate the lifecycle of this applet; hence,advantageously providing persistence to the agent across successivecontent pages. Consequently, the agent continues executing until theuser terminates execution of (closes) the browser itself.

Thus, the agent persists and functions transparently in background,independent and transparent to user navigation across pages on a commonweb site and across web sites. In that regard, the agent effectivelyimplements a background process which runs in parallel with and istransparent to normal HTML and HTTP operations implemented by the clientbrowser.

To significantly simplify the description and the accompanying drawings,we have intentionally omitted from this discussion specific Java classesthat constitute the AdController agent as well as, to increase a rate atwhich advertisements can be queued for playback, an accompanyingsoftware architecture for processing these classes on a multi-threadedpipelined basis. Such details are conventional in nature; hence, theiruse in implementing our present invention would be readily apparent toany one skilled in the art.

B. Client PC

FIG. 3 depicts a block diagram of client PC 5.

As shown, the client PC comprises input interfaces (I/F) 320, processor340, communications interface 350, memory 330 and output interfaces 360,all conventionally interconnected by bus 370. Memory 330, whichgenerally includes different modalities, including illustratively randomaccess memory (RAM) 332 for temporary data and instruction store,diskette drive(s) 334 for exchanging information, as per user command,with floppy diskettes, and non-volatile mass store 335 that isimplemented through a hard disk, typically magnetic in nature. Massstore 335 may also contain a CD-ROM or other optical media reader (notspecifically shown) (or writer) to read information from (and writeinformation onto) suitable optical storage media. The mass store storesoperating system (O/S) 337 and application programs 400; the latterillustratively containing browser 7 (see, e.g., FIGS. 1B and 1C) whichimplements our inventive technique. O/S 337, shown in FIG. 3, may beimplemented by any conventional operating system, such as the WINDOWSNT, WINDOWS 95, or WINDOWS 98 operating system (“WINDOWS NT”, “WINDOWS95” and “WINDOWS 98” are trademarks of Microsoft Corporation of Redmond,Washington). Given that, we will not discuss any components of O/S 337as they are all irrelevant. Suffice it to say, that the browser, beingone of application programs 400, executes under control of the O/S.

Incoming information can arise from two illustrative external sources:network supplied information, e.g., from the Internet and/or othernetworked facility, through communication link 9 to communicationsinterface 350, or from a dedicated input source, via path(es) 310, toinput interfaces 320. Dedicated input can originate from a wide varietyof sources, e.g., an external database. In addition, input information,in the form of files or specific content therein, can also be providedby inserting a diskette containing the information into diskette drive334 from which client PC 5, under user instruction, will access and readthat information from the diskette. Input interfaces 320 containappropriate circuitry to provide necessary and corresponding electricalconnections required to physically connect and interface each differingdedicated source of input information to client PC 5. Under control ofthe operating system, application programs 400 exchange commands anddata with the external sources, via network connection 9 or path(es)310, to transmit and receive information typically requested by a userduring program execution.

Input interfaces 320 also electrically connect and interface user inputdevice 395, such as a keyboard and mouse, to client PC 5. Display 380,such as a conventional color monitor, and printer 385, such as aconventional laser printer, are connected, via leads 363 and 367,respectively, to output interfaces 360. The output interfaces providerequisite circuitry to electrically connect and interface the displayand printer to the computer system.

Furthermore, since the specific hardware components of client PC 5 aswell as all aspects of the software stored within memory 335, apart fromthe modules that implement the present invention, are conventional andwell-known, they will not be discussed in any further detail. Generallyspeaking, agent server 15 and third-party ad server 20 each has anarchitecture that is quite similar to that of client PC 5.

C. Software

1. Application Programs 400

FIG. 4 depicts a simplified high-level block diagram of applicationprograms 400 resident within the client PC.

As shown, the application programs, to the extent relevant, containbrowser 7 and resident JAVA player files 410, i.e., files for JAVA mediaplayers that have previously been installed onto the hard disk of theclient PC. These players may illustratively include audio, streamingaudio, video and multi-media players.

Browser 7 contains AdController agent 420, when it has been fully loadedfor execution into browser cache, browser disk cache 430 and Javavirtual machine 440 (which has been discussed above to the extentrelevant). As noted, this agent persists whenever the user causesbrowser 7 to transition across different web content pages or differentweb sites, and functions independently and transparently of any suchpages and sites. The AdController agent includes applet registry 426 forfacilitating inter-applet communication within the agent.

The AdController agent contains two applets: Transition Sensor applet422 and AdController applet 424 (also referred to as applet 210 in FIG.2B). As discussed above, the Transition Sensor applet accomplishes threebasic functions. First, this applet loads, instantiates and starts theAdController applet. Second, the Transition Sensor applet communicatesan Internet address of an advertising server, here server 20, to requestan advertisement, specifically an AdDescriptor file therefor, that is tobe downloaded and subsequently presented. Lastly, the Transition Sensorapplet, through associated click-stream monitoring (performed by aTransition Sensor implemented by this applet), determines when a usersituated at client browser 7 undertakes an affirmative action, such as,e.g., causing a mouse click, to request a next successive web page bedownloaded and rendered, and so notifies the AdController agent of thatevent. This event signals a start of an ensuing interstitial interval.

AdController applet 424, which is not embedded in any content page,executes under but is not controlled by browser 7. This applet, also asdiscussed above, accomplishes several basic functions. First, it createsall other objects that collectively form a run time agent executionmodule for the agent. As noted above, this includes extending standardJava applet class definitions by over-riding standard Java applet init,start, run, stop and destroy life cycle methods. Second, theAdController applet “politely” downloads advertising (including mediaand, where necessary, player) files, through the client browserexecuting at a client computer, into browser disk cache and in a mannerthat is transparent to a user situated at the browser. Lastly, theAdController applet interstitially plays advertisements through theclient browser in response to the user click-stream associated withnormal user navigation across different web pages.

Browser disk cache 430 stores downloaded AdDescriptor files 433 andaccompanying and downloaded media and player files 437.

2. AdController Agent 420

FIG. 5 depicts a high-level block diagram of AdController agent 420.

As shown, the agent specifically contains Transition Sensor applet 422,AdController applet 424 and applet registry 426.

As discussed generally above, the Transition Sensor applet implements,as one of its functions, a transition sensor which detects, through usernavigation click-stream monitoring, a user-initiated transition to a newweb page, and produces, in response, a corresponding Transition Sensorevent. Such a transition occurs in response to an actual user initiatedmouse click or key depression to activate a hotlink appearing on acurrently displayed content page in order to move to a new content page,either on the same site or on another site. Another such transitionoccurs whenever a stored history of web pages just visited by the userchanges state. The latter is sensed by a JavaScript function thatmonitors a history stored in browser disk cache 430 of visited web pageURLs and generates an event whenever the history changes state. For easeof reference, we will collectively define the term “click-stream” toencompass any user-initiated transition to a new content page, whetherit is a mouse click, key depression or history state change.

Transition Sensor events are used to trigger the play of anadvertisement only if, by then, all the media and player files for thatadvertisement have been fully cached into browser disk cache 430.Otherwise, play of that advertisement is deferred until after all thosefiles are cached and the advertisement is ready to be rendered and,importantly, in response to the next user-initiated transition.

Client browser 7 produces init (initialize) and start and stopTransition Sensor events, as symbolized by line 505 and 510,respectively. The init and start events are produced by the browser toinitialize (i.e., load and instantiate) and start the Transition Sensorapplet. The stop events are also produced by the browser, though througha Transition Sensor stop method which has been substituted for astandard browser stop method, in response to detection, by theTransition Sensor, of user-initiated page transitions. These eventscontrol the state of applet 422. Transition Sensor applet 422communicates directly with AdController applet 424, as symbolized byline 535—such as to pass an Internet address of an advertising server,and indirectly, as symbolized by line 530, through applet registry 426.Registry 426 passes information, as symbolized by line 540, toAdController applet 424.

As noted above, AdController applet 424 extends standard Java appletclass definitions by over-riding standard Java applet init, start, run,stop and destroy life cycle methods. Doing so, particularly in the caseof the Stop method (which will be described below in conjunction withFIG. 18), permits the AdController applet to persist in browser diskcache 430 as the user navigates across successive pages and web sites.

Advantageously, the AdController applet can readily function in a widevariety of environments, without changes to the coding of the appletitself. This is accomplished through downloading of an externalconfiguration file (specifically file 620 shown in FIGS. 6A and 6B,which will be discussed below), as part of the applet files, from agentserver 15. Suitably changing parameter values in the configuration filepermits the behavior of applet 424 to be readily changed to suit adesired environment without a need to utilize a different version ofthat applet for each different environment, otherwise requiringdifferent software classes and with attendant modifications andre-compilation.

Execution of AdController applet 424 begins by Transition Sensor applet422 calling a standard init Applet method, which downloads the externalconfiguration file, followed by extracting and saving its configurationparameters. These parameters are supplied, as symbolized by line 515, tothe AdController applet, during its execution in order to define itsbehavior given its current execution environment.

As noted above, AdController applet 424 “politely” and transparentlydownloads advertising (including media and, where necessary, player)files, through browser 7 into browser disk cache 430, for each and everyadvertisement that is to be subsequently and interstitially played. Adata path through which advertisements are downloaded is shown in FIG. 5by dot-dashed lines; while that for advertisement play is shown in thisfigure by dotted lines.

Specifically, to download and play advertisements, applet 424 implementsAd Pipeline 545 (which will be discussed in detail below in conjunctionwith FIG. 14). Pipeline 545 implements various threads (processes) anddata structures which collectively load advertising files into browserdisk cache 430 (and, for media files, also into browser RAM cache) andthen present fully downloaded advertisements. The pipeline implements AdProducer, Ad Location and Ad Downloader processes (processes 1500, 1600,1700 shown in FIGS. 15, 16 and 17, respectively, and discussed in detailbelow), and download queue 1430 and play queue 1470 (both of which areshown in FIG. 14 and discussed in detail below).

In essence, once Transition Sensor applet 422, as shown in FIG. 5,supplies AdController applet 424 with a URL of an AdDescriptor file, AdPipeline 545 then downloads, as symbolized by dot-dashed line 520, theAdDescriptor file, via agent server 15 (serving as a proxy server), froma remote advertising management system. As noted above, this filecontains a manifest of media and player files necessary to fully play acomplete advertisement. Once this AdDescriptor file has been downloadedinto Ad Pipeline 545 then, once the downloading (to the extent needed)is complete, pipeline 545 then “politely” downloads, as symbolized byline 525, each file specified in the manifest—to the extent that filedoes not already reside on the client hard disk. Pipeline 545 then, oncethe downloading (to the extent needed) is complete, writes theAdDescriptor file to the play queue and each downloaded file specifiedtherein to browser disk cache 430; hence forming a queued advertisementfor subsequent access.

At the inception of an interstitial interval, signaled by a TransitionSensor stop event, the AdController applet interstitially plays anadvertisement that has then been completely queued—both in terms of itsmedia and player files. In particular, at the start of that interval,the Ad Pipeline retrieves an AdDescriptor that is then situated at thehead of a play queue. Media players 565 required by that advertisement,as specified in the AdDescriptor file, are started in the orderspecified in that file along with their corresponding media file(s). Aresulting processed media stream, produced by the player(s), and assymbolized by line 570, is rendered through browser 7 to the user. Mediaplayers 565 may permanently reside, i.e., apart from being downloaded byagent 420, on the client hard disk (thus being implemented by residentplayer files 410 as shown in FIG. 4) or be downloaded by pipeline 545into browser disk cache 430 (and also browser RAM cache) for subsequentaccess and use (thus stored within files 437 shown in FIG. 4).

Once an advertisement completely plays, AdController applet 424, asshown in FIG. 5, establishes an appropriate log entry for a “userimpression” for that advertisement. Advertisement files are retained inthe browser disk cache until that cache completely fills, at which pointthese files, like any other content files stored in that cache, aredeleted by the browser on a first-in first-out (i.e., age order) basis.Media players 565, browser 7 and browser disk cache 430 are all shown indashed lines as these components, while being used by the AdControlleragent, are not viewed as constituting components solely within the agentitself.

FIGS. 6A and 6B collectively depict a high-level flowchart of processingoperations 600 performed by AdController agent 420; the correctalignment of the drawing sheets for these figures is shown in FIG. 6.Though, the operations depicted in this figure—and also in FIGS. 8, 9Aand 9B, 12, and 14-19—occur through a multi-threaded approach to processmultiple advertisements on a pipelined basis, to simplify all thesefigures, the sequential processing flow shown in each of these figuresis that which processes a single common advertisement. Description ofthreads and classes is provided to the extent needed to provide asufficient understanding to those skilled in the art as to how thesesequential processing flows would preferably be implemented through amulti-threaded Java class methodology.

Upon entry into process 600 as shown in FIGS. 6A and 6B, which occurs inresponse to an Transition Sensor init event from browser 7, block 610 isperformed. Through this block, Transition Sensor applet 422 instructsthe applet registry to load the AdController applet. Once that occurs,block 615 is performed through which external AdController configurationfile 620 is retrieved from agent server 15. Thereafter, through decisionblock 630, agent 420 waits, by looping through NO path 631, untilbrowser 7 generates a Transition Sensor start event. When such an eventoccurs, execution proceeds, via YES path 633 emanating from thisdecision block, to block 635. Through this latter block, AdControllerapplet 424 obtains an Internet address of an advertisement managementsystem (e.g., system 25) from which the agent is to retrieveAdDescriptor file 645. Applet 424 then passes this address to AdPipeline 545. The Ad Pipeline, as indicated in block 640, then retrievesAdDescriptor file 645 from this address and particularly through agentserver 15 serving as a proxy server. Once this file is retrieved, theagent performs block 650 which “politely” downloads all the media andplayer files 655 (to the extent each file does not already reside on theclient hard disk), from advertising management system 25 (residing onadvertising server 20), and, through block 660, stores these files intobrowser disk cache 430 (and, in the case of media files, into browserRAM cache). As noted above, these files are downloaded via agent server15, which here too serves as a proxy server. This downloading continuesuntil either it finishes or a Transition Sensor stop event generated bythe browser arises, whichever occurs first. As to the stop event,decision block 665 tests for its occurrence, with execution loopingback, via NO path 666, in the absence of such an event. However,whenever this event occurs, such as (as discussed above) in response toa user-initiated page transition, decision block 665 routes execution,via YES path 668, to block 670. This latter block then, using mediaplayers 565, plays an advertisement then fully queued in the play queueon the browser disk cache, i.e., an AdDescriptor file for this ad thenresides at a head of the play queue and all associated media and playerfiles for that advertisement, as specified in that AdDescriptor file,then reside on the client hard disk.

3. AdController Applet 424

FIG. 7 depicts a high-level block diagram of basic execution threadsthat implement AdController applet 424.

As shown, in response to a Transition Sensor init event produced by theclient browser, one thread executes block 710 to initialize AdControllerapplet 424. This block performs the downloading (to the extentnecessary) and instantiation of applet 424. In response to a TransitionSensor start event produced by the client browser, another thread, byexecuting block 720, starts the AdController applet. Once this applet isstarted, this applet, in turn and as discussed above, through executionof block 730, enables downloading of advertising (media and player)files to commence. In response to a received Internet address of aremote ad management system (here, e.g., system 25 shown in FIGS. 1B and1C) supplied by the Transition Sensor applet, a third thread requests,through execution block 740 shown in FIG. 7, an AdDescriptor file fromthe ad management system situated at this address and then downloadsAdDescriptor file 645 received in response. If, by this time, block 730has enabled advertisement downloading, then advertising files, asspecified in AdDescriptor file 645, are “politely” downloaded asrequired. In response to a Transition Sensor stop event produced by theclient browser and which signals an inception of an interstitialinterval, another thread, here commencing with execution of block 750,suspends downloading of advertisement files in favor of displaying aqueued advertisement. Once this downloading is suspended, this lastthread invokes block 760 to commence play of an advertisement thensituated, in terms of its AdDescriptor file, at a head of the playqueue.

FIG. 8 depicts a high-level flowchart of processing operations 800performed by AdController applet 424.

Upon entry into operations 800, which occurs in response to an initevent produced by the Transition Sensor applet, block 805 is performed.Through this block, the AdController applet is initialized. Thisincludes downloading files, to the extent needed, for this applet fromthe agent server and then instantiating this applet. Once this occurs,block 810 tests for an occurrence of AdController start event producedby the Transition Sensor applet. Until this event occurs, executionmerely loops back, via NO path 812, to block 810. When this eventoccurs, decision block 810 routes execution, via YES path 814, to block815. This latter block, retrieves external AdController configurationfile 620 from the agent server. Thereafter, block 820 occurs throughwhich the AdController applet creates and starts Ad Pipeline 545. Oncethe pipeline is fully started, then, block 825 is performed to enableadvertisement files to be “politely” downloaded into the Ad Pipeline andto thereafter actually download such files. While advertisement filesare being downloaded or thereafter, if such downloading has completed,decision block 830 tests for an occurrence of a Play Ad event. If nosuch event occurs, then execution loops back, via NO path 833, todecision block 830 to continue any further downloading. If however, aPlay Ad event occurs, then decision block 830 routes execution, via YESpath 837, to block 840. This latter block suspends further downloadingof advertisement files into the Ad Pipeline. Once this occurs, thenblock 845, when performed, issues a request to the Ad Pipeline to playan advertisement having its AdDescriptor file then located at the headof the play queue. While the advertisement is being played, decisionblock 850 tests for an occurrence of an shutdown event generated by thebrowser, such as caused by, e.g., a user-initiated transition or theuser closing an advertisement window or closing the browser itself. Ifsuch an event does not occur, decision block 850 routes execution, viaNO path 853, back to block 825 to re-enable “polite” download ofadvertisement files once again. If such a shutdown event occurs, thenprocessing operations 800 terminate, via YES path 857.

FIGS. 9A and 9B collectively depict a flowchart of processing operations900 performed by AdController applet 424 specifically for processing anadvertisement; the correct alignment of the drawing sheets for thesefigures is shown in FIG. 9.

Upon entry into operations 900, block 905 is performed to receive arequest, issued by the Transition Sensor applet, to download a nextadvertisement, specifically a corresponding AdDescriptor file. Thisrequest contains an Internet address of a remote ad management system.In response to this request, AdController applet 424 performs block 910to request Ad Producer process (also being a thread) 1500 to download anad. The Ad Producer process, as will be discussed below in conjunctionwith FIG. 15, requests advertisement files, specifically an AdDescriptorfile, from an Internet address communicated by the Transition Sensorapplet. Thereafter, through block 915, the Ad Producer process blocks(i.e., it actively waits for its input data) until this process receivesthe Internet address of the remote advertising management system.Thereafter, block 920 executes to cause Ad Location process (also beinga thread) 1600 to block until such time as the AdDescriptor file isfully downloaded by Ad Producer process 1500 and is provided to the AdLocation process. Ad Location process 1600, as will be discussed belowin conjunction with FIG. 16, performs the following tasks: (a) onstartup of process 1600, this process creates an Ad Producer object; (b)it asks Ad Producer process 1500 for next AdDescriptor file 645; and (c)once process 1600 obtains such AdDescriptor file 645 and if downloadqueue 1430 (see FIG. 14) is not full, it writes that file into thisqueue. If this queue is then full, process 1600 simply waits until thequeue is not full before writing the AdDescriptor file into the queue.Once the AdDescriptor file has been completely downloaded, Ad Locationprocess 1600 inserts, as shown in block 925, this file into downloadqueue 1430.

Once AdDescriptor file 645 is inserted into the download queue, then AdDownloader process (also being a thread) 1700 executes. This process, aswill be discussed below in conjunction with FIG. 17, performs a singlechain of tasks.

First, as shown by block 930, process 1700 blocks until such time as theAdDescriptor file for the advertisement to then be downloaded becomesavailable in the download queue. During its execution, this process asksdownload queue 1430 if there is an AdDescriptor file therein, i.e., sucha file for which advertising files need to be downloaded. If thedownload queue is empty, then AdDescriptor process 1700 both waits untilthat queue is not empty and also retrieves the AdDescriptor file overthe network. Once the Ad Downloader process has retrieved theAdDescriptor file, this process, through execution of block 935,requests browser cache proxy 1450 (shown in FIG. 14) to download all admedia and player files. In response to this request, browser cache proxy1450 then downloads, as shown by block 940, all the advertising filesspecified in the AdDescriptor file, into browser disk cache (and, in thecase of media files, into browser RAM cache). Once all the advertisingfiles have finished downloading, the Ad Downloader process, as shown inblock 950, moves the AdDescriptor file to play queue 1470 (see FIG. 14).However, if the play queue is then full, the Ad Downloader process willwait until the play queue is not full before moving the AdDescriptorfile into this queue.

The Browser Cache Proxy implements an interface to an abstract cache.The cache implementation could be any kind of cache—the browser disk orRAM cache, a Java virtual memory cache, a local raw disk cache, and soforth. Once passed through this cache proxy, the media files thatconstitute an advertisement will have been downloaded into both disk andRAM cache of the browser. Whenever the Ad Downloader processsubsequently tries to access any media file having an identical URL tothat downloaded, this process will first attempt to load the files fromthe browser disk cache or browser RAM cache instead of downloading thefile, via the Internet, from its advertising management server; thusleveraging, even across different referring web pages or sites and tothe extent possible, a one time download of an advertising file acrossdifferent advertisements.

Next, should a Transition Sensor stop event occur, i.e., indicative of astart of a next interstitial interval, then Transition Sensor stopmethod 1800 will request, as shown by execution of block 955, thatAdController applet 424 then play an advertisement. In response to thisrequest, an event scheduler thread within the applet will block, asshown in block 960, until such time as applet 424 responds to thisrequest by initiating play of an advertisement. The event schedulerthread controls playing of advertisements to the user. This threaddetermines when to execute media players specific to the nextadvertisement in the play queue (i.e., in terms of correspondingAdDescriptor files situated in that queue), as well as provides acallback method which the player executes when that player hassuccessfully completed presenting an advertisement as specified in itscorresponding AdDescriptor file. Once the AdController applet hasinitiated play of an advertisement, then, as shown by block 965, theevent scheduler retrieves an advertisement, specifically thecorresponding AdDescriptor file, then situated at the head of the playqueue. Thereafter, the event scheduler, as shown in block 970, launchesexecution of the specific media player(s) 565 (see FIG. 5), as specifiedin the corresponding AdDescriptor file, to play this particularadvertisement. The browser disk cache provides the associated contentfiles for this advertisement to the media player(s). Once theadvertisement has been fully presented, then, as shown in block 975,AdController applet 424, through the event scheduler thread,appropriately logs this presentation into a log file maintained in thebrowser disk cache for subsequent uploading to the agent server.Execution then exits from operations 900.

A logger process (also implemented as a thread) keeps track of all logentries that need to be sent back to the agent server. This processsimply timestamps entries and adds them to a log buffer. Then,periodically, the logger process will flush the log back to the agentserver where those entries can be archived and analyzed.

For an advertisement, player mechanisms take associated media filesspecified in the associated AdDescriptor file from the browser cache andactually display these files to a user via a viewable frame or window.The user will view a pre-cached smoothly playing advertisement out ofthe browser disk cache and, where appropriate for media files, frombrowser RAM cache, rather than being streamed in over the Internet. Fourmodes for displaying advertisements are supported; namely, user-eventtriggered ad play, frame-targeted ad play, timer-based ad play and PopUpJava frame play. Each of these player mechanisms uses a media playermodule (contained within media players 565 shown in FIG. 5) and a playerthread. The player thread provides an actual presentation of advertisingmedia to the user then operating the client browser. The combination ofa player and a player thread provides capabilities of: controllingtime-based frequency of advertisement play using an agent configurabletimer; displaying advertising media files in a browser window or Javaframe; waiting a configurable amount of time (usually the length of theadvertisement as specified in its AdDescriptor file); and terminatingthe advertisement visually upon completion, or at a request of the userif the advertisement, as configured in its AdDescriptor file, permitspre-mature termination.

A frame-targeted play renders advertisement media onto a browser window.Such play is interruptible and restartable upon user-demand. Timer-basedad play utilizes a separate thread that continuously loops to: obtain anAdDescriptor file from the play queue; display that advertisement usinga player and player thread; and sleep for a specified amount of timebefore repeating this sequence. Timer-based ad play is alsointerruptible and restartable upon user-demand. The result of this typeof advertisement play is that the user will periodically viewadvertisements delivered at regular time intervals rather than by userinitiated events. The PopUp Java frame play is a separate thread thatalso continuously loops to: obtain an AdDescriptor file from the playqueue; waits for a signal that a user-initiated transition is occurring;pops up a display window (“pop-up” window) in the browser, for apre-defined period of time, and presents the advertisement in thatwindow; and removes the pop up window before repeating this sequence.The result of the PopUp Java Player is that the user will viewsuccessive advertisements each for pre-defined time interval (which canvary from one advertisement to the next, as specified in theAdDescriptor files for each such advertisement) whenever the usertransitions between one web page and the next. Once an advertisement iscompletely played and in the absence, as discussed above of anyinstructions in the AdDescriptor file to replay that advertisement, suchas through, e.g., timer-based ad play, the associated AdDescriptor fileis effectively “pulled off” the play queue.

In particular, downloading of advertisement files occurs, as discussedpreviously, continuously as effectively a background process, using aseparate asynchronous thread. The stop method of the Transition Sensor(specifically Transition Sensor stop method 1800 as will be describedbelow in conjunction with FIG. 18) is responsible for generating a playevent to the AdController agent. This event notifies the agent of anopportunity to present a downloaded advertisement to the user. This stopmethod is called automatically by the client browser whenever a usertransitions off a web page that contains the embedded advertising tag.In particular, this method invokes a start player method in theAdController agent. The start player method, in turn, invokes asimilarly named method, in the event scheduler, which initiates andcontrols the presentation of advertisements during content pagetransitions. The event scheduler ensures all media files for anadvertisement have been transparently downloaded before theirpresentation, as well as exercises control over actual execution of theappropriate player classes required to visibly render the advertisement.In that regard, the event scheduler instantiates and invokes a playerclass appropriate for the current advertisement by calling a startmethod of that class. This start method creates the player thread thatperforms visual rendering of the advertisement. Then, this start methodcalls a run method of the player thread in order to visually present theadvertising media from the browser disk and RAM caches. Upon completion,based on the configuration of the advertisement, the run method, byexecuting its own stop method, terminates the advertisement either upondetecting a close request by the user or completion of ad play timeout.The stop method performs any player software termination and cleanup,finally executing a callback to the scheduler object.

4. Inter-applet Events Involving Transition Sensor Applet 422

FIG. 10 depicts inter-applet events 1000 that occur within AdControlleragent 420 during execution of Transition Sensor applet 422.

As shown and discussed above, whenever a browser interprets and thenexecutes advertising tag 40, specifically tag 42 therein, situatedwithin content page 35, this causes, as symbolized by line 1010, thebrowser to download script 200 (see FIGS. 2A and 2B) from the agentserver. This applet, in turn, dynamically writes Transition Sensorapplet 210 (also referred to as applet 422) into the referring webcontent page. As discussed above, once this applet is instantiated andexecuted by the client browser, the applet, in turn, instantiates appletregistry 426.

Once the applet registry is instantiated, the Transition Sensor queriesthe registry, this operation being symbolized by line 1015, to determinecurrent status of the AdController applet. If, as symbolized by line1020, the registry indicates that the AdController applet is not loadedand hence is not executing, then Transition Sensor applet 422 loads, assymbolized by line 1025, AdController applet 424 from the browser diskcache, and then instantiates and starts this applet. Once theAdController applet is instantiated, the Transition Sensor appletwrites, as symbolized by line 1030, appropriate entries, indicating thatboth the Transition Sensor applet is loaded and, as symbolized by line1035, that the AdController applet is loaded, into the applet registry.Once this occurs, then the applet registry returns, as symbolized byline 1040, an appropriate handle for the AdController applet to theTransition Sensor in order to permit the latter to refer to the former.Thereafter, as symbolized by line 1060, the Transition Sensor passes, asdiscussed above, a request containing an Internet address of anadvertisement management system to the AdController applet to downloadan AdDescriptor file, for an advertisement, from that address. Thisaddress is specified in tag 44 of advertising tag 40 and, as symbolizedby dashed line 1050, incorporated into the request. Thereafter, theTransition Sensor, in response to a user-initiated transition(click-stream) to a next content web page, executes its stop method(method 1800 shown in FIG. 18) to instruct, i.e., issue a request to, assymbolized by line 1065, the AdController applet to play a fullydownloaded advertisement having its corresponding AdDescriptor file thensituated at the head of the play queue. Once this occurs, the TransitionSensor applet terminates its execution until the browser nextencounters, interprets and executes a content page containingadvertising tag 40 at which point the Transition Sensor applet isre-loaded and re-started; and so forth.

5. Transition Sensor Applet 422

FIG. 11 depicts a high-level block diagram of basic processing threadsthat implement Transition Sensor applet 422.

As shown, in response to a Init (Initialize) Transition Sensor appletevent produced by the client browser, a thread commences by executingblock 1110 to initialize Transition Sensor applet 422. This thread, inturn, executes block 1120 to load AdController applet 424 from browserdisk cache or download it from the agent server, if necessary, and thenload it. Thereafter, this thread executes block 1130 to obtain theInternet address of an advertising management system (e.g., system 25shown in FIGS. 1B and 1C, 2A and 2B, and 10) in tag 44 from advertisingtag 40.

As shown in FIG. 11, in response to a Start Transition Sensor appletevent generated by the client browser, another thread commences byexecuting block 1140 to enable Ad Downloader process 1700 (as discussedabove, and to be discussed in detail below in conjunction with FIG. 17)to commence “polite” downloading an AdDescriptor file and all requiredand associated advertisement files (both media and player) into thebrowser disk cache.

Further, as shown in FIG. 11, in response to a Stop Transition Sensorapplet event generated by the client browser, a third thread commencesby executing block 1150 to disable Ad Downloader process 1700 and thussuspend further downloading of advertisement files. Once this occurs,this thread then executes block 1160 to instruct the AdController appletto play a fully downloaded advertisement having its correspondingAdDescriptor file then situated at the head of the play queue.

FIG. 12 depicts a high-level flowchart of processing operations 1200performed by Transition Sensor applet 422.

Upon entry in operations 1200, decision block 1210 tests for anoccurrence of an init event produced by the client browser. Until suchan event occurs, execution loops back, via NO path 1213, to block 1210.When this event occurs, execution proceeds, via YES path 1217 to block1220 which, when performed, initializes Transition Sensor applet 422.Thereafter, block 1230 is performed through which the Transition Sensorapplet 424 instructs, by issuing a request to, the AdController appletto download an advertisement, specifically as discussed above anAdDescriptor file from an ad management server specified in theadvertising tag. Once this occurs, decision block 1240 tests for anoccurrence of a Transition Sensor start event generated by the clientbrowser. Until such an event occurs, execution loops back, via NO path1243, to block 1240. When this particular event occurs, executionproceeds, via YES path 1247 to block 1250 which, when performed, enablesAd Pipeline 545 to download the AdDescriptor file and associatedadvertising files.

Next, decision block 1260 tests for an occurrence of a Transition Sensorstop event generated by the client browser. Until such an event occurs,execution loops back, via NO path 1263, to block 1260. When a TransitionSensor stop event occurs, execution then proceeds, via YES path 1267 toblock 1270 which, when performed, requests that AdController applet 424,specifically via Ad Pipeline 545, then play an advertisement.

6. Ad Loader Process 1300

FIG. 13 depicts a high-level block diagram of Ad Loader process 1300which forms a portion of AdController applet 424. Process 1300 providesan advertiser (specifically an advertising programmer) with control overvarious functions, for advertisement play and logging, implemented bythe AdController applet, specifically how and where this appletretrieves advertisements across a networked connection and how thoseadvertisements are played. Through use of the Ad Loader, theAdController applet can be controlled, to an extent desired, by externalprogrammatic calls.

As shown, this process includes Ad Loader API (application programminginterface) 1310 which interfaces to Ad Pipeline 545 and through thispipeline controls how advertisements are presented, as symbolized byblock 1370, by the player mechanisms. In particular, the Ad Loader APIprovides information regarding and, through setting various programvariables, permits programmer control over advertisement display anddownloading operations. In that regard, these variables provide acallback to the AdController applet indicating when a content page towhich the user has just transitioned has completed its downloading; andcan be used to: instruct the AdController applet when to download a nextadvertisement, when to play a next advertisement fully queued in the AdPipeline, start and stop a play timer (for use with, e.g., timer-basedad play, as discussed above), log a message, set a mode so as to specifya desired location to display advertisements, suspend and resumedownload of advertisement files into the Ad Pipeline, suspend a currentdownload for a given period of time, and suspend and resumeadvertisement play by the player mechanisms.

In that regard, the Ad Loader API configures Ad Pipeline 545 such thatAdDescriptor file 645 is downloaded, as symbolized by block 1320, from aremote ad management system into the Ad Pipeline in response to receiptof an Internet address of an ad management system and, for targetedadvertisements, a URL of a referring web page address. As symbolized byblock 1330, the API configures the Ad Pipeline such that advertisementdownloading is enabled only when AdController applet 424 is not playingan advertisement. Furthermore, as symbolized by block 1340, the APIconfigures the Ad Pipeline such that advertisement downloading isdisabled whenever the AdController applet is playing an advertisement.Furthermore, as symbolized by block 1350, the API configures the AdPipeline such that advertisement play is to commence in response to arequest to play a next advertisement, i.e., one that is fully cached inthe browser disk cache and having its AdDescriptor file then situated atthe head of the play queue.

7. Ad Pipeline 545

FIG. 14 depicts a high-level block diagram of Ad Pipeline 545. Asdiscussed above, the Ad Pipeline implements various threads and datastructures which collectively load advertising files (needed media andplayer files) into the browser disk cache and, for media files, alsointo browser RAM cache, and then present fully downloadedadvertisements. As noted, the Ad Pipeline employs Ad Producer process1500, Ad Location process 1600 and Ad Downloader process 1700 (all ofthese processes, as noted above, are also threads).

In response to an incoming request to download an advertisement, AdPipeline 545 is invoked. Specifically, within this pipeline, first block1410 executes to invoke Ad Producer process 1500 in response to anincoming request to download an advertisement. As discussed above, thisrequest, issued by the Transition Sensor applet, includes an Internetaddress of a remote ad management system (e.g., system 25 shown in FIGS.1B and 1C) on which an advertisement resides and is to be downloaded(through agent server 15 as a proxy server). Ad Producer process 1500,as will be discussed below in conjunction with FIG. 15, requestsadvertisement files, specifically an AdDescriptor file (e.g., file 645),from an Internet address specified in the request. During its execution,the Ad Producer process waits until it receives the Internet address ofthe remote advertising management system, whereupon this process thendownloads AdDescriptor file 645 from the specified ad management system.Once this file has been downloaded, block 1420, shown in FIG. 14,executes to invoke Ad Location process 1600 (which will be discussed indetail below in conjunction with FIG. 16). During its execution, AdLocation process 1600 blocks until such time as AdDescriptor file 645 isfully downloaded by Ad Producer process 1500 and is provided to the AdLocation process, whereupon the Ad Location process writes thisAdDescriptor file into download queue 1430.

After AdDescriptor file 645 has been written into the download queue, AdLocation process 1600, as will be discussed below in conjunction withFIG. 16, performs the following tasks: (a) on startup of process 1600,this process creates an Ad Producer object; (b) this process asks AdProducer process 1500 for next AdDescriptor file 645; and (c) onceprocess 1600 obtains AdDescriptor file 645 and, if download queue 1430is not full, process 1600 writes that file into this queue. If thisqueue is then full, process 1600 simply waits until the queue is notfull before writing the AdDescriptor file into the queue. Once theAdDescriptor file has been completely downloaded, Ad Location process1600 inserts, as shown in block 925, this file into download queue 1430.

Once AdDescriptor file 645 is inserted into the download queue, thenblock 1440 executes to invoke Ad Downloader process 1700. Process 1700,which will be discussed below in conjunction with FIG. 17, performs asingle chain of tasks. First, process 1700 blocks until such time as thedownloaded AdDescriptor file has become available in the download queue.During its execution, this process asks download queue 1430 if itcontains an AdDescriptor file, e.g., file 645. If so, then advertisingfiles need to be downloaded for that particular AdDescriptor file. Ifthe download queue is empty, then process 1700 both waits until thatqueue is not empty and also retrieves the AdDescriptor file over thenetwork. Once Ad Downloader process 1700 has obtained this AdDescriptorfile, process 1700 then downloads, all the media and required playerfiles specified in the AdDescriptor file by using Browser Cache Proxy1450, into browser disk (and PAM) cache 1460. Once all the advertisingfiles have finished downloading, process 1700 moves the AdDescriptorfile to play queue 1470. However, if the play queue is then full, the AdDownloader process waits until play queue 1470 is not full before movingthe AdDescriptor file into this queue for subsequent ad play. Asdiscussed above, AdDescriptor file 645 for a fully queued ad (i.e., withits all the associated media and player residing on the client harddisk) is subsequently retrieved from play queue 1470 in response to arequest to play an advertisement, this request being issued in responseto a Transition Sensor stop event.

8. Ad Producer Process 1500

FIG. 15 depicts a high-level block diagram of Ad Producer process 1500.As noted above, this process requests an AdDescriptor file from anInternet address communicated by the Transition Sensor applet andsubsequently downloads that file into the browser disk cache.

As shown, upon entry into process 1500, execution first proceeds todecision block 1510. This block determines whether a URL has beenreceived, from the Transition Sensor, from which to fetch anAdDescriptor file. If such a URL has not yet been received, thenexecution loops back, via NO path 1517, to this decision block.Alternatively, if such a URL has been received, then execution proceeds,via YES path 1513, to block 1520 which, in turn, stores this URL, as AdURL 1530, for use during a next successive advertisement downloadopportunity.

Once this URL has been so stored, execution proceeds to decision block1540. This block tests for an occurrence of a user-initiated event(click-stream) signifying that advertisement downloading can now occur,such as, e.g., when the user has just closed an existing advertisementframe and a next successive content page to which the user hastransitioned is being rendered by the client browser. If such an eventhas not yet occurred, e.g., the next successive content web page isdownloading, then execution merely loops back, via NO path 1543, back todecision block 1540. However, if such an event occurs, then thisdecision block routes execution, via YES path 1547, to block 1550. Thislatter block, when executed, downloads AdDescriptor file 645 using theURL communicated by the Transition Sensor. Once this file is completelydownloaded, then block 1560 executes to transfer this file to AdLocation process 1600. Thereafter, execution loops back, via path 1565,to decision block 1510, and so forth.

9. Ad Location Process 1600

FIG. 16 depicts a high-level block diagram of Ad Location process 1600.This process, as discussed above, accomplishes the following tasks: (a)on startup of this process, process 1600 creates an Ad Producer object;(b) process 1600 asks Ad Producer process 1500 for next AdDescriptorfile 645; and (c) once process 1600 obtains AdDescriptor file 645 and,if download queue 1430 (see FIG. 14) is not full, process 1600 thenwrites that file into this queue. If this queue is then full, process1600 simply waits until the queue is not full before writing theAdDescriptor file into the queue.

Upon entry into process 1600 and with respect to advertisementdownloading itself, execution proceeds to decision block 1610. Thisdecision block, when executed, determines whether an Internet address(URL) of an ad management system has been received from the TransitionSensor applet for a next successive advertisement download. If thataddress has not yet been received, then execution merely loops back, viaNO path 1613, to decision block 1610. Alternatively, if such an addresshas been received but not yet processed, then decision block 1610 routesexecution, via YES path 1617, to block 1620. This latter block requestsAd Producer process 1500 to download an AdDescriptor file, e.g., file645, from this URL. Once this request occurs, execution proceeds todecision block 1630 to determine whether this AdDescriptor file has beencompletely downloaded. If this file download is still occurring, thenexecution merely loops back, via NO path 1633, to block 1630 to awaitcompletion of the download. Once this download completes, decision block1630 routes execution, via YES path 1637, to block 1640. This latterblock writes the downloaded AdDescriptor file into download queue 1430(providing this queue is not full). Once this occurs, execution isdirected, via path 1645, back to decision block 1610, and so forth.

10. Ad Downloader Process 1700

FIG. 17 depicts a high-level block diagram of Ad Downloader process1700. Essentially, as discussed above, process 1700 determines, from thedownload queue, if that queue contains an AdDescriptor file, e.g., file645. If it does contain such an AdDescriptor file, then advertisingfiles need to be downloaded for that file. Consequently, process 1700then downloads required advertising files specified in that AdDescriptorfile. Once this fully occurs, process 1700 moves the AdDescriptor fileto the play queue.

In particular upon entry into process 1700, execution proceeds todecision block 1710. This decision block determines whether the downloadqueue then contains an AdDescriptor file, e.g., file 645. If the queueis empty, then execution merely loops back, via NO path 1717, to thisdecision block to await such an AdDescriptor file. However, if downloadqueue 1430 then contains such a file, process 1720 obtains theAdDescriptor file then situated at the head of this queue. Thereafter,block 1730 executes. This block downloads all the required advertisingfiles, not then resident on the client hard disk, into browser proxycache 1450. This block also transfers all the associated media files inthe browser proxy cache to the browser RAM cache. Execution thenproceeds to decision block 1740 which determines whether all requiredadvertising files have then been downloaded. If any such file remains tobe downloaded, then decision block 1740 routes execution, via NO path1747, back to block 1730 to download that file. Alternatively, if allthe required advertising files have been downloaded, then executionproceeds, via YES path 1743, to block 1750. This latter block moves theAdDescriptor file from download queue 1430 to an end of play queue 1470.Once the AdDescriptor file is written into the play queue, thecorresponding advertisement is then ready to be presented to the user,in order relative to other AdDescriptor files then queued in the playqueue, during an ensuing interstitial interval.

11. Transition Sensor Stop Method 1800

FIG. 18 depicts a flowchart of stop method 1800 invoked by TransitionSensor applet 422. This method, in response to a stop event generated bythe browser, suspends downloading of advertisement files and initiatesinterstitial ad play.

In particular, upon entry into method 1800, decision block 1810 executesto determine if a stop event has been received from browser 7. If such astop event has yet not occurred, then execution loops back, via NO path1813, back to block 1810 to await occurrence of this event. When thisevent occurs, decision block 1810 directs execution, via YES path 1817,to decision block 1820. This latter decision block determines ifAdController applet 424 is then loaded and executing. If this applet isnot then executing, decision block 1820 routes execution, via NO path1827, to block 1830. This latter block inhibits any request from beingmade to the AdController applet to play any advertisement until thatapplet is executing and, once that occurs, a next user-initiated(click-stream) event occurs. Thereafter, execution of method 1800terminates. Alternatively, if the AdController applet is loaded andexecuting, then decision block 1820 routes execution, via YES path 1823,to block 1840. This latter block requests the AdController applet toplay a next advertisement. Once this request is issued, then executionproceeds to block 1850. This block, in turn, requests the AdControllerapplet to suspend “polite” background downloading of advertisement fileswhile a next successive web content page, as requested by the user, isbeing downloaded by the browser. Once block 1850 executes, execution ofmethod 1800 terminates.

12. Transition Sensor Start Method 1900

FIG. 19 depicts a flowchart of start method 1900 invoked by TransitionSensor applet 422. This method, in response to a start event generatedby the browser, resumes background downloading of advertisement files.

Specifically, upon entry into method 1900, execution proceeds todecision block 1910 which, when executed, determines if a start eventhas been received from browser 7. If such a start event has not yetoccurred, then execution loops back, via NO path 1913, back to block1910 to await occurrence of this event. When this event occurs, decisionblock 1910 directs execution, via YES path 1917, to decision block 1920.This latter decision block determines if AdController applet 424 is thenloaded and executing. If this applet is not then executing, decisionblock 1920 routes execution, via NO path 1927, to block 1930. Block 1930inhibits any request from being made to the AdController applet todownload any advertisement until that applet is executing and, once thatoccurs, a next user-initiated (click-stream) event occurs. Once theAdController applet begins executing and thereafter a nextuser-initiated (click-stream) event occurs, execution proceeds to block1940. This latter block requests the AdController applet to resumebackground downloading of advertisement files. Once this downloading isresumed, method 1900, through execution of block 1960, waits for browser7 to call Transition Sensor stop method 1800 whenever the user nextunloads a web page currently rendered by the browser, i.e., causes auser initiated-event to transition to a next successive web page.Alternatively, if the AdController applet is loaded and executing, thendecision block 1920 routes execution, via YES path 1923, to block 1950.Since at this point the next successive content web page has been fullyexecuted by the browser and is, e.g., rendered to the user, block 1950issues a request, through the applet registry, to the AdControllerapplet to enable it to resume background downloading of advertisementfiles. Once this occurs, block 1940 is executed to issue a request tothe AdController applet to resume the background downloading. Executionthen proceeds to block 1960 to wait for browser 7 to call TransitionSensor stop method 1800 whenever the user next unloads a web pagecurrently rendered by the browser, i.e., causes a user initiated-eventto transition to a next successive web page. Whenever the browsergenerates a next Transition Sensor stop event, process 1900 terminates.

Although a single embodiment which incorporates the teachings of ourpresent invention has been shown and described in considerable detailherein, those skilled in the art can readily devise many otherembodiments and applications of the present invention that still utilizethese teachings.

We claim:
 1. Apparatus for a information management network server, foruse in distributing an information object to a client computer,comprising: a processor; and a memory connected to the processor andstoring computer executable instructions; and wherein the processor, inresponse to the executable instructions: receives a request from aprocess executing in the client computer to download a manifest file tothe client computer, the request being issued in response to execution,by a browser in the client computer, of an associated tag embedded in aweb page accessed by the browser, wherein the tag specifies a networkaddress of the information management network server to which theprocess issues the request but is substantially independent of and doesnot specify any information object so as to substantially decouple theweb page from said any object; selects, in response to the request, agiven one of a plurality of information objects to be displayed on theclient computer and, in response thereto, accesses a manifest filestored in the memory and associated with the given one informationobject, wherein the manifest file comprises a manifest of names of aplurality of predefined informational files that collectively comprisepart of the given one information object, a network address at whicheach of the predefined informational files can be accessed by the clientcomputer and associated configuration information necessary to properlyplay the given one information object through the client computer; anddownloads the manifest file to the client computer so that the clientcomputer can subsequently access the informational files from theirrespective network addresses.
 2. The apparatus in claim 1 wherein thegiven one information object comprises a web advertisement, the manifestfile comprises an Ad Descriptor file and the informational filescomprise advertising files.
 3. The apparatus in claim 2 wherein each ofthe advertising files comprises a media file which contains content forthe advertisement or at least one player file for rendering anassociated media file through the client computer.
 4. The apparatus inclaim 3 wherein the Ad Descriptor file comprises entries for differentversions of player and media files for different operating systemscapable of being executed on the client computer.
 5. The apparatus inclaim 3 wherein the tag has a component specifying the informationmanagement network server, the information management network serverbeing an advertising server.
 6. The apparatus in claim 5 wherein theclient computer, in response to executing the tag, issues the request todownload the Ad Descriptor file from the information management networkserver specified in the component.
 7. The apparatus in claim 3 furthercomprising a proxy server wherein the request is directed from theclient computer, via the proxy server, to the information managementnetwork server and the Ad Descriptor file is directed from theinformation management network server, via the proxy server, to theclient computer.
 8. The apparatus in claim 3 wherein the processor, inresponse to the stored instructions, selects the given one informationobject in response to prior user-specific actions or user-specificinformation previously collected from the client computer and associatedwith a user, wherein the actions or said information is indicative ofpreferences of the user.
 9. The apparatus in claim 8 wherein the AdDescriptor file comprises entries for different versions of player andmedia files for different operating systems capable of being executed onthe client computer.
 10. The apparatus in claim 8 wherein the tag has acomponent specifying the information management network server, theinformation management network server being an advertising server. 11.The apparatus in claim 10 wherein the client computer, in response toexecuting the tag, issues the request to download the Ad Descriptor filefrom the network server specified in the component.
 12. The apparatus inclaim 8 further comprising a proxy server wherein the request isdirected from the client computer, via the proxy server, to theinformation management network server and the Ad Descriptor file isdirected from the information management network server, via the proxyserver, to the client computer.
 13. In conjunction with a informationmanagement network server used for distributing an information object toa client computer, the server having a processor, and a memory connectedto the processor and storing computer executable instructions, a methodcomprising the steps, performed by the processor in response to theinstructions, of: receiving a request from a process executing in theclient computer to download a manifest file to the client computer, therequest being issued in response to execution, by a browser in theclient computer, of an associated tag embedded in a web page accessed bythe browser, wherein the tag specifies a network address of theinformation management network server to which the process issues therequest but is substantially independent of and does not specify anyinformation object so as to substantially decouple the web page fromsaid any object; selecting, in response to the request, a given one of aplurality of information objects to be displayed on the client computerand, in response thereto, accesses a manifest file stored in the memoryand associated with the given one information object, wherein themanifest file comprises a manifest of names of a plurality of predefinedinformational files that collectively form the given one informationobject, a network address at which each of the predefined informationalfiles can be accessed by the client computer and associatedconfiguration information necessary to properly play the given oneinformation object through the client computer; and downloading themanifest file to the client computer so that the client computer cansubsequently access the informational files from their respectivenetwork addresses.
 14. The method in claim 13 wherein the given oneinformation object comprises a web advertisement, the manifest filecomprises an Ad Descriptor file and the informational files compriseadvertising files.
 15. The method in claim 14 wherein each of theadvertising files comprises a media file which contains content for theadvertisement or at least one player file for rendering an associatedmedia file through the client computer.
 16. The method in claim 15wherein the Ad Descriptor file comprises entries for different versionsof player and media files for different operating systems capable ofbeing executed on the client computer.
 17. The method in claim 15wherein the tag has a component specifying the information managementnetwork server, the information management network server being anadvertising server.
 18. The method in claim 17 further comprising thestep, performed by the client computer in response to executing the tag,of issuing the request to download the Ad Descriptor file from theinformation management network server specified in the component. 19.The method in claim 15 further comprising the steps of: directing therequest from the client computer, via a proxy server, to the informationmanagement network server; and directing the Ad Descriptor file from theinformation management network server, via the proxy server, to theclient computer.
 20. The method in claim 15 further comprising the step,performed by the processor, of selecting the given one informationobject in response to prior user-specific actions or user-specificinformation previously collected from the client computer and associatedwith a user, wherein the actions or said information is indicative ofpreferences of the user.
 21. The method in claim 20 wherein the AdDescriptor file comprises entries for different versions of player andmedia files for different operating systems capable of being executed onthe client computer.
 22. The method in claim 20 wherein the tag has acomponent specifying the information management network server, theinformation management network server being an advertising server. 23.The method in claim 22 further comprising the step, performed by theclient computer in response to executing the tag, of issuing the requestto download the Ad Descriptor file from the information managementnetwork server specified in the component.
 24. The method in claim 20further comprising the steps of: directing the request from the clientcomputer, via a proxy server, to the information management networkserver; and directing the Ad Descriptor file from the informationmanagement network server, via the proxy server, to the client computer.25. Apparatus for an advertising server, for use in distributing a webadvertisement to a client computer, comprising: a processor; and amemory connected to the processor and storing computer executableinstructions; and wherein the processor, in response to the executableinstructions: receives a request from a process executing in the clientcomputer to download a manifest file to the client computer, the requestbeing issued in response to execution, by a browser in the clientcomputer, of an associated tag embedded in a web page accessed by thebrowser, the tag having a component which specifies a network address ofthe advertising network server to which the process issues the request;accesses, in response to the request, a specific one of a plurality ofmanifest files stored in the memory, said one manifest file beingassociated with a given one of a plurality of web advertisements to bedisplayed on the client computer, wherein the manifest file comprises amanifest of names of a plurality of predefined advertising files thatcollectively comprise part of the given one advertisement, a networkaddress at which each of the predefined advertising files can beaccessed by the client computer and associated configuration informationnecessary to properly play the given one advertisement through theclient computer, the advertising files comprising at least one mediafile which contains content for the one advertisement or at least oneplayer file for rendering an associated media file through the clientcomputer; and downloads the specific one manifest file to the clientcomputer so that the client computer can subsequently access theadvertising files from their respective network addresses.
 26. Theapparatus in claim 25 wherein the client computer, in response toexecuting the tag, issues the request so as to download an Ad Descriptorfile from the advertising server specified in the component. 27.Apparatus for an advertising server, for use in distributing a webadvertisement to a client computer, comprising: a processor; and amemory connected to the processor and storing computer executableinstructions; and wherein the processor, in response to the executableinstructions: receives a request from a process executing in the clientcomputer to download a manifest file to the client computer, the requestbeing issued in response to execution, by a browser in the clientcomputer, of an associated tag embedded in a web page accessed by thebrowser, the tag having a component which specifies a network address ofthe advertising network server to which the process issues the request;accesses, in response to the request and either prior user-specificactions or user-specific information previously collected from theclient computer and associated with the user wherein the actions or saidinformation is indicative of preferences of the user, a specific one ofa plurality of manifest files stored in the memory, said one manifestfile being associated with a given one of a plurality of webadvertisements to be displayed on the client computer, wherein themanifest file comprises a manifest of names of a plurality of predefinedadvertising files that collectively comprise part of the given oneadvertisement, a network address at which each of the predefinedadvertising files can be accessed by the client computer and associatedconfiguration information necessary to properly play the given oneadvertisement through the client computer, the advertising filescomprising at least one media file which contains content for the oneadvertisement or at least one player file for rendering an associatedmedia file through the client computer; and downloads the specific onemanifest file to the client computer so that the client computer cansubsequently access the advertising files from their respective networkaddresses.
 28. The apparatus in claim 27 wherein the client computer, inresponse to executing the tag, issues the request so as to download anAd Descriptor file from the advertising server specified in thecomponent.
 29. In conjunction with an advertising server used fordistributing a web advertisement to a client computer, the server havinga processor, and a memory connected to the processor and storingcomputer executable instructions, a method comprising the steps,performed by the processor in response to the instructions, of:receiving a request from a process executing in the client computer todownload a manifest file to the client computer, the request beingissued in response to execution, by a browser in the client computer, ofan associated tag embedded in a web page accessed by the browser, thetag having a component which specifies a network address of theadvertising network server to which the process issues the request;accessing, in response to the request, a specific one of a plurality ofmanifest files stored in the memory, said one manifest file beingassociated with a given one of a plurality of web advertisements to bedisplayed on the client computer, wherein the manifest file comprises amanifest of names of a plurality of predefined advertising files thatcollectively comprise part of the given one advertisement, a networkaddress at which each of the predefined advertising files can beaccessed by the client computer and associated configuration informationnecessary to properly play the given one advertisement through theclient computer, the advertising files comprising at least one mediafile which contains content for the one advertisement or at least oneplayer file for rendering an associated media file through the clientcomputer; and downloading the specific one manifest file to the clientcomputer so that the client computer can subsequently access theadvertising files from their respective network addresses.
 30. Themethod in claim 29 further comprising the step, performed by the clientcomputer in response to executing the tag, of issuing the request so asto download an Ad Descriptor file from the advertising server specifiedin the component.
 31. In conjunction with an advertising server used fordistributing a web advertisement to a client computer, the server havinga processor, and a memory connected to the processor and storingcomputer executable instructions, a method comprising the steps,performed by the processor in response to the instructions, of:receiving a request from a process executing in the client computer todownload a manifest file to the client computer, the request beingissued in response to execution, by a browser in the client computer, ofan associated tag embedded in a web page accessed by the browser, thetag having a component which specifies a network address of theadvertising network server to which the process issues the request;accessing, in response to the request and either prior user-specificactions or user-specific information previously collected from theclient computer and associated with the user wherein the actions or saidinformation is indicative of preferences of the user, a specific one ofa plurality of manifest files stored in the memory, said one manifestfile being associated with a given one of a plurality of webadvertisements to be displayed on the client computer, wherein themanifest file comprises a manifest of names of a plurality of predefinedadvertising files that collectively comprise part of the given oneadvertisement, a network address at which each of the predefinedadvertising files can be accessed by the client computer and associatedconfiguration information necessary to properly play the given oneadvertisement through the client computer, the advertising filescomprising at least one media file which contains content for the oneadvertisement or at least one player file for rendering an associatedmedia file through the client computer; and downloading the specific onemanifest file to the client computer so that the client computer cansubsequently access the advertising files from their respective networkaddresses.
 32. The method in claim 31 further comprising the step,performed by the client computer in response to executing the tag, ofissuing the request so as to download an Ad Descriptor file from theadvertising server specified in the component.